What Should You Do If The Patient's Words About Allergy Contradict Medical History?

Recently, DentistryIQ media published another part of the regular dental podcast with their permanent hosts – Dr. Pamela Maragliano-Muniz, chief editor of the gazette and doctor of dental medicine, and Dr. Tom Viola – a professional pharmacist with 30 years of experience.

In this part, they touched on a crucial topic for any practitioners, including dentists – contradictions between patients' words and their medical history.

Here are Dr. Viola's key insights.

Facts are in the first place

Remember the human factor – sometimes we can forget about the condition if we do not face it regularly. At the same time, such misunderstandings may be the opposite when patients are confident that they have allergies because a long time ago, they felt sick after some medicines. (actually, they just may have experienced some side effects)

In both situations, you should remember that you are the clinician and can trust facts only! Allergies can not just disappear – in most cases, it is a lifetime condition, so, most likely, if patients' medical history contains records about it, you should prioritize this information.

Find proper words

In some cases, patients may insist on a specific drug prescription because they read on the internet or heard from a friend that this medicine will work.

If this drug contains an allergen – there is a problem. If the patient strongly insists – there is a big problem!

Again, in this situation, you should think as a clinician: perhaps you don't want to argue with your patient, but you definitely do not want to give them the wrong drug because that would mean that any health consequences (and they will happen) are your fault. This patient may end up in an emergency or even worse. Briefly, for you, as a professional, there is no option to agree to prescribe potential allergen.

Instead, you should try to convince your patient to use alternative drugs that have the same pharmaceutical effect but do not cause an allergy. Explain to them that there is no difference between active components and describe the alternative's advantages (such as lack of side effects), whatever you can remember in that a situation. Ultimately, you may say that you can not prescribe the potential allergens due to medical ethics if the patient still insists.

Ask the professional

When it's unclear whether the patient has an allergy and you need some evidence to prove it, the best decision is to check all the patient's medical records to track down the mentions of a particular condition. Even better, if you can find (or ask the patient) the phone number of a pharmacist or other doctor who worked with the patient in the past, that may clarify the situation.

Read other insights about dentist-patient communication on our Newsfeed:

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