New research presented 5/2011 at the Pediatric Dentistry Conference is evaluating Buzzy's cold and vibration versus a sham Buzzy for children receiving injections.  Dental shots and the drill sound can ramp up anxiety even for those who don't have needle phobia, and adults often search for visual distraction during the sensitive parts of cleaning.  Buzzy and Bee-Stractors can help!  Just as with injection pain anywhere else in the body, blocking sensations with vibration and cold decreases sharp pain from needles. This is known as "gate control". Vibration travels better through hard body parts (bone) than soft (fat), so placing Buzzy directly on the maxilla (upper jaw bone) or mandible (lower jaw) closer to the ear than the middle of the face helps.  Buzzy's vibration is strong, and the ice pack should be frozen for the most intense blocking, so make sure you or your patients experiment with Buzzy first for a few seconds to get used to the BUZZ and cold.  As with any needle procedure, leave Buzzy in place during the injection; Buzzy works in the same way that cold running water soothes a burn, or shaking your hand after whacking it with a hammer helps.  Take away the cold or quit shaking and the pain comes back immediately.   By the way, for those "too cool for a bee", Buzzy comes in plain executive black.

If the sensation is too strong, simply holding Buzzy in a hand or pressing it other places on the head can help also, in two ways.  1: Strong sensations anywhere activate "descending inhibition" - the body naturally tries to dampen out a continued stimulus.  2: Think of the ability to feel pain as a bandwidth issue: if you fill that bandwidth with other sensations, there is less ability to feel pain.  Examples are pinching yourself someplace other than where you're getting a shot, so your perception of the shot pain is less because you're also paying attention to the pinch.

While Buzzy can provide some physical distraction, research has shown that mental distraction can decrease distress from pain by about 50%.  To engage the anterior cingulate gyrus, the part of the brain that can modulate pain, we invented Bee-Stractors.  These posters or flip cards have counting and finding tasks to pull attention away from pain.  Simply put a poster on a wall or ceiling and mount the questions where a practioner can see them, or have a parent ask the questions on the card while the patient holds up fingers to answer the finding questions.  "How many monkeys are on the bed?"  Bee-Stractor posters come in two versions, while there are two sets of 5 Bee-Stractor cards: the original Monkey set (available in English and Spanish), and the BumblingSpree set (English only).  To see a video of how a parent would use Bee-Stractors for an IV access attempt, click here.