Variables Affecting General Anesthesia Time for Pediatric Dental Cases

The purpose of this study was to identify variables affecting procedural times for dental treatments performed in the operating room (OR) under general anesthesia.

A total of 2,264 OR cases at Boston Children's Hospital were included in the study. A series of patient, provider, and operational variables were studied, including: patient age, gender, American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) class, need for intraoperative radiographs, intubation type, provider type, referring provider type, referral date, waiting time between referral and OR, and symmetry of caries pattern. Analysis of variance, z test, t test, Pearson correlations, and regression modeling were used.

Provider inexperience, need for obtaining radiographs, older age, higher ASA class, and oral intubation significantly increased surgical case times. Using the current OR case estimation resulted in an overestimation of 14.6 hours per month. Application of our regression model improved the accuracy of case time estimation by 7.9 hours per month.

Overestimation of pediatric dental operating room cases exists, and identification of variables associated with these inaccuracies can aid providers in recapturing underutilized operating room times.