The psychological effects

Visiting the dentist is not high on most people’s list of favourite things to do. The NHS website has a page dedicated to ‘fear of the dentist’ while the British Dental Health Foundation offers leaflets and information on overcoming dental phobia and anxieties. But whatever level of confidence a patient may have regarding visiting their dentist, they may find another concern equally troubling.

Bad breath has long been something of a taboo subject in society. In a recent survey of 2024 people only 29 per cent of respondents said they would tell someone if they had bad breath, while 71 per cent wanted to be told if they were suffering.

Halitosis’ effects can be far-reaching and research in the Netherlands in 2005 revealed that it constituted “one of the 100 biggest human overall exasperations” and further, that it causes “embarrassment and affects their social communication and life.”

Just how badly a patient can be affected by the condition is evident from a retrospective study conducted over a seven-year period (February 2003-February 2010) by the University of Basel in Switzerland.