PLEASE NOTE:

Following Registration and Payment:

Please Read the instructions in your Confirmation email.

It will include a link to a brief Zoom webinar registration form that must be completed PRIOR to the course.

Please click on that link and complete the form at your earliest convenience.

After completion, you will receive an email from PittDentalCE that includes

a link to join the course on the scheduled date/time.

For more information on how to participate in our Zoom webinars: Zoom Participation Guide.

Policies and General Information

Note: This course is designed to meet PA Act 124 dental re-licensure requirements for pain management and practices of prescribing or dispensing of opioids.

(Act 124 requires prescribers to complete at least 2 hours of Board-approved continuing education in pain management, identification of addiction or the practices of prescribing or dispensing of opioids as a portion of the total CE required for biennial renewal.)

Overview:

This clinically relevant 2-hour webinar presentation is composed of two parts:

• Part one will help clinicians understand the extent and nature of the opioid crisis. It will also instruct clinicians on how to best identify patients who may be seeking opioid prescriptions to satisfy an addiction.
• Part two will provide a pharmacologically sound rationale for the use of a multimodal post-operative pain management technique instead of relying solely on opioids. The provided specific protocol begins the moment that the dental procedure is completed and allows for most patients to experience minimal post-treatment pain. The protocol enables clinician's to rarely rely on the need to prescribe opioids. Most Dental offices can become a narcotic-free zone without having patients suffer needlessly.

Participant takeaways from this course:

• Learn tips on how to avoid being the “Office to seek-out if patients are looking for narcotics”.
• Dental clinicians can predictably diminish post-operative pain by understanding and utilizing a non-addictive multimodal pain control protocol.

Objectives:

Following this presentation, the participants will understand:

• how extensive the opioid crisis is,
• how clinicians can identify patients who are at risk for opioid abuse,
• what government regulatory agencies require clinicians to know and do,
• opioid pharmacology for pain control and how it can innocently lead to addiction,
• a logical multimodal analgesia protocol for the control of post-operative pain, and
• when and how to safely use a glucocorticosteroid to control post-operative inflammation.

James L. Rutkowski, DMD, PhD

General Dentist in Clarion, PA, with a practice concentrating on implant dentistry and treating medically compromised patients.

Associate Professor, University at Buffalo School of Dental Medicine.