This website presents guidance from the Scottish Dental Clinical Effectiveness Programme (SDCEP) which is relevant to the management of a patient presenting to any healthcare professional, with symptoms of an acute dental problem. The guidance was developed using SDCEP's established methodology and is endorsed as a source of reliable, high quality, professional advice, with UK-wide relevance, that promotes the provision of safe and effective oral health care for patients.

The Management of Acute Dental Problems guidance aims to:

• encourage a consistent approach to the management of acute dental problems to reduce unwarranted variation in practice
• improve the quality of unscheduled clinical care for patients with acute dental problems
• provide best practice advice for the initial management of presenting symptoms for patients with acute dental problems
• ensure patients receive appropriate advice about subsequent care and/or referral to appropriate treatment providers, if applicable

The guidance includes decision support flowcharts that represent the pathways to the appropriate providers of care, based on the patient’s presenting symptoms. These flowcharts are intended for use by staff in any healthcare setting who may be asked to advise or manage patients with acute dental problems, including non-dental professionals such as general medical practice, emergency department and pharmacy staff. Advice about the initial management and subsequent care for a wide range of conditions that may present as acute dental problems is also provided.

An online decision support tool to aid users of the guidance is in development and will be available on the Right Decision Service website.

For a list of the main changes in this second edition of this guidance, see Introduction.

'Supporting, safe, effective, sustainable, person-centred prevention and care'