Emergency Drugs

Emergency drugs may be divided into two categories. The first category is drugs that are essential and should be part of every emergency drug kit. The second category consists of drugs that are useful but are optional depending on the practitioner’s training in emergency medical procedures and whether sedation and general anesthesia are used for behavior and anxiety management. Thus, emergency drug kits will vary from office to office. A dentist trained to administer general and intravenous sedation with greater proficiency in venipuncture would have a more comprehensive drug kit than a dentist without such training. For dentists not proficient in venipuncture, optional drugs that can be administered orally, intramuscularly/sublingually and intranasally will be discussed. For a more comprehensive review, kindly refer to American Dental Association’s recently published guide on preparation of a dental team for medical emergencies.⁵

At the very least, a basic dental office emergency drug kit should contain the eight drugs summarized in Table 1.

For the dentists with advanced training and skills in sedation and general anesthesia, the additional emergency drugs in Table 2 may be added to the drug kit.