How this guidance is presented

This page explains how the Management of Acute Dental Problems guidance is presented in this website. See below for advice on how to use the website and tips on how to get the best from it.

Home page

Guidance
- sets out Overarching principles and presents flowcharts to illustrate decision support pathways for patients with pain, swelling, bleeding, trauma, ulceration, altered sensation or abnormal appearance in the head and neck, in Pathways to providers of care. These pathways link to more detailed advice on the initial management and subsequent care for a range of oral conditions, provided in Management of oral conditions.
About this guidance includes
- the background, scope and main changes in this edition of the guidance, within the Introduction
- guidance development and the methodology employed
- information about endorsers of the guidance
Supporting tools provides supplementary information, including advice on analgesia, advice on medication related oral side effects and a glossary.

Page features

Within the Management of oral conditions section, the guidance on each condition or group of conditions is presented as follows:

Brief description of condition

Includes brief background information

Key signs and symptoms

A bulleted list of signs and symptoms that help initiate an assessment of the patient’s condition

Initial Management

Immediate care that any care provider could follow (i.e. dental or non-dental).

Initial management advice points are presented in this format in panels of this colour.

Given that this guidance is written for a wide range of healthcare workers, it is recognised that some professionals may not be qualified to prescribe drugs. Where prescribing advice is given in this section, these professionals can direct patients to those who are able to prescribe the drugs recommended. Similarly, healthcare professionals who are unable to make referrals to other services (e.g. urgent suspected cancer referrals) should direct patients to a healthcare professional who can.

Subsequent Care

The follow-on care provided by a dental or other healthcare professional.

Subsequent care advice points are presented in this format in panels of this colour.

These subsections are deliberately not overly prescriptive because it is recognised that many factors can influence the choice of care options. Instead, the range of issues or approaches to be considered are provided, and clinical detail has been kept to a minimum.

Search and navigation

The top menu provides easy access to Guidance, About this guidance, Supporting tools, Search
Use the left-hand menus to delve more deeply into the guidance or go back a level.
Use the right-hand menus to quickly navigate to content on the same page.
Use the search function to find specific information of interest. Page titles that match your search term are listed first in the search results. If your search term is not in a page title, it is likely to be in the first few pages listed.
On any page, click the Home icon to return to the Home page.
Use the Navigation page to access links to all pages on the website.