By Dr. Nicole M. Berger, DDS — South Florida Smile Spa, Pompano Beach

Quick answer Fear of the dentist is the norm, not the exception. A 2025 census-matched survey published in The Journal of the American Dental Association found that 72.6% of U.S. adults report being afraid of going to the dentist, and 26.8% of those describe that fear as severe. Sedation dentistry exists to solve this. Dr. Nicole M. Berger, DDS, a sedation dentist in Pompano Beach, offers nitrous oxide, oral conscious sedation, and IV (twilight) sedation, and she administers and monitors IV sedation personally under Florida certification rather than outsourcing it. Sedation can be used for routine cleanings and fillings, not just surgery, and it lets multiple procedures be combined into one appointment. Call (954) 785-1100 to talk it through.

The hardest part of my job is not a difficult extraction or a complicated full-arch case. It is the phone call that starts with an apology. Someone calls a sedation dentist in Pompano Beach and the first thing out of their mouth is sorry — sorry it has been so long, sorry about the state of their teeth, sorry to be a bother. They have rehearsed the apology. Sometimes they have rehearsed it for years.

I want to take that apology off the table, because it is built on a false premise. The premise is that being afraid of the dentist makes you unusual. It does not. It makes you typical. And the fear itself is not a character flaw to be overcome by willpower — it is a clinical obstacle with clinical solutions, which is the entire reason sedation dentistry exists.

Here is what the fear actually consists of, what a sedation dentist can do about each piece of it, and how people who have been away for a decade come back.

You Are Not the Exception — You Are the Majority

In September 2025, The Journal of the American Dental Association published the first nationally representative study of dental fear in the United States. The finding: 72.6% of U.S. adults report being afraid of going to the dentist. Among those, 45.8% described their fear as moderate and 26.8% described it as severe.

Read that again. Nearly three out of four adults. If you have been carrying this as a private embarrassment, the data says you are surrounded by people carrying the same thing quietly. The person in the waiting room reading their phone, the coworker who cancels appointments, your own family members — statistically, most of them are afraid too.

That study mattered to me for a second reason. Of the people who reported fear, 71.2% said they were interested in treatment to address it. People are not resigned to this. They want a way through. Most of them have simply never been offered one that felt credible.

The 6 Fears That Keep People Out of the Chair

When I sit down with an anxious patient, the fear is almost never one undifferentiated blob. It breaks into specific pieces, and each piece has a specific answer. These are the six I hear most often as a sedation dentist in Pompano Beach.

1. The needle

This is the most common single fear, and it is often the whole fear. People who describe themselves as terrified of dentistry are frequently not afraid of drills or dental work at all — they are afraid of the injection. The answer is direct: with IV sedation, the last thing you are aware of is a small pinch in your arm, and the dental injections happen after you are already deeply relaxed. You do not experience them. With nitrous oxide, topical anesthetic and a slow, warmed injection technique make it a fraction of what you are bracing for.

2. Pain — or not getting numb

Some people are not imagining this. There is a real subset of patients whose anatomy or biochemistry makes profound local anesthesia genuinely hard to achieve, and if that has happened to you once, your fear is evidence-based rather than irrational. A sedation dentist changes that equation in two ways: sedation raises your comfort threshold independently of the local anesthetic, and it lets me take the time to supplement anesthesia properly instead of racing a patient who is white-knuckling the armrests.

3. Gagging or feeling like you cannot breathe

A strong gag reflex is exhausting and humiliating in equal measure, and it makes routine care feel impossible. Sedation substantially suppresses the gag reflex, which is often the single change that makes impressions, X-rays, and back-of-the-mouth work tolerable for the first time in a patient’s adult life. For patients whose fear centers on breathing or feeling trapped, IV sedation with continuous vitals monitoring means someone is watching your oxygen the entire time — you are not managing that alone.

4. Being judged

This one is not clinical, and it is the one that keeps people away the longest. Patients tell me they are more afraid of the lecture than the drill. So let me be explicit about what a sedation dentist should say, and what I say: I do not lecture. A ten-year gap does not surprise me, it does not disappoint me, and it tells me nothing about you as a person. It tells me you had a bad experience, or a hard stretch of life, or a fear nobody helped you solve. Shame is a clinical obstacle, because it delays care and lets small problems become large ones. I have no interest in adding to it.

5. Losing control

Lying flat while someone works inside your mouth removes your ability to speak, to see what is happening, and to stop it. For patients with a history of trauma, that combination is not a minor discomfort. This is worth naming out loud with your sedation dentist, because control can be given back deliberately: an agreed hand signal that stops everything immediately, a walkthrough of each step before it happens, and a choice about how deep the sedation goes. Conscious sedation means you can still respond and still signal. You are not handing over the controls.

6. How many visits it will take

When someone has avoided care for years, the imagined treatment plan is often an endless corridor of appointments — and that vision alone stops people from making the first call. In practice, one of the real advantages of IV sedation is consolidation. Work that would normally be split across five or six visits can frequently be completed in one or two longer appointments, because you are comfortable and I am not stopping to let you recover between procedures. Fewer visits, less time off work, and a shorter road than the one in your head.

Nitrous, Oral, or IV — Three Tools a Sedation Dentist Uses

Sedation dentistry is not one thing, and matching the level to the patient is most of a sedation dentist’s skill. Nitrous oxide is inhaled, takes effect in minutes, wears off almost as fast, and lets most patients drive themselves home — it suits mild-to-moderate anxiety and routine visits. Oral conscious sedation is a pill taken before your appointment, producing a deeper, drowsy calm for patients who need more than nitrous but do not need an IV.

IV sedation — twilight sedation — is delivered through a small line in your arm and titrated in real time, meaning I can adjust the depth during treatment rather than hoping a pill lands correctly. Most patients remember little to nothing afterward. At South Florida Smile Spa I administer and monitor IV sedation personally, under Florida certification, so the doctor doing the dentistry is the doctor watching your vitals. That is not something we hand to an outside provider.

What Coming Back Actually Looked Like for One Patient

A man in his forties — I will call him Daniel — had not seen a dentist since a childhood appointment that went badly. Twenty-six years. He had started chewing exclusively on his left side, then stopped eating in front of colleagues, then stopped going to lunches at all. When he finally called a sedation dentist, he apologized twice before he finished his first sentence.

We did not touch a single instrument on his first visit. He sat upright, fully clothed, in a consultation room, and we talked through what sedation would actually involve and what the hand signal meant. He scheduled. He canceled. He rescheduled six weeks later and came in. Under IV sedation we completed work that would have taken five separate appointments, in two.

What I remember is not the clinical result. It is that he called back a few months later to book a routine cleaning — with nitrous, not IV, because he no longer needed the heavier option. That is what recovery from dental fear actually looks like. Not one heroic visit, but a nervous system that slowly learns the chair is safe.

What Avoidance Costs Beyond Your Teeth

I would not push this if it were only about teeth. But the mouth does not operate independently of the rest of you. Untreated periodontal disease is a chronic bacterial infection with an inflammatory burden your whole body carries, and the research connecting it to cardiovascular disease, poorly controlled blood sugar, and adverse pregnancy outcomes has been accumulating for years.

There is a quieter cost too. People avoiding dental care shift their diets toward soft, processed, easy-to-chew food, because that is what does not hurt. Over years that changes nutrition, blood sugar, and energy. And the social withdrawal Daniel described — declining meals, covering your mouth, hanging back in photographs — is not vanity. It is a real reduction in the size of someone’s life. Fear is expensive, and almost none of that expense shows up on a dental chart.

How to Come Back: Choosing a Sedation Dentist in Pompano Beach

Start with a conversation, not an appointment. When you call a sedation dentist in Pompano Beach, you can say plainly that you are anxious and that you want to talk before anything is scheduled — and a practice that handles fear well will make room for exactly that. Come in, stay upright, keep your shoes on, and ask your sedation dentist every question you have. Nothing has to happen that day.

Bring a complete list of your medications and any medical conditions, because that is what determines which sedation options are open to you. Ask who administers the sedation and what your sedation dentist’s certification is. Ask what the stop signal is. And if the front desk or the doctor makes you feel small for the gap in your history, leave and call somewhere else — there is no clinical reason to accept that, and you have already waited long enough.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I find a sedation dentist in Pompano Beach who takes dental anxiety seriously?

Look for three things. First, ask who administers the sedation: at South Florida Smile Spa, Dr. Nicole M. Berger, DDS holds Florida IV sedation certification and administers and monitors it herself rather than outsourcing it. Second, ask whether more than one level of sedation is offered, since nitrous, oral, and IV suit very different patients. Third, notice whether the practice asks about your history before it proposes treatment. A sedation dentist who is genuinely comfortable with fearful patients will ask what went wrong last time.

Will a sedation dentist judge me for how long it has been since my last visit?

No. Practices that focus on dental anxiety see long gaps constantly, and a decade away is unremarkable to us. Dr. Berger’s position is that shame is a clinical obstacle, not a moral one: patients who expect to be lectured stay away longer, and their treatment needs grow while they wait. The visit is about what happens next, not about the years behind you.

Can I be sedated for a routine cleaning, or only for surgery?

Sedation is appropriate for routine care too, including cleanings and fillings, and any sedation dentist should offer it for both. For many anxious patients, the cleaning is the hardest appointment to face, because it is the one they have avoided the longest. Nitrous oxide is often enough for routine visits, while oral or IV sedation suits longer or more complex treatment.

Does sedation mean I will be unconscious during dental treatment?

No. Nitrous, oral, and IV sedation are all forms of conscious sedation, not general anesthesia. You can respond to your sedation dentist and follow simple instructions throughout. With IV sedation most patients remember little to nothing afterward, which is why they describe it as sleeping through the appointment, but you are never fully unconscious.

Is sedation dentistry safe if I have a medical condition or take medication?

Often yes, but that is exactly what the screening determines. Before any sedation we review your full medical history, current medications, and overall health to confirm you are a candidate, and vitals are monitored continuously during treatment in accordance with Florida sedation regulations. Bring a complete medication list, including supplements, to your consultation.

How many visits will it take to fix years of avoided dental work?

Usually fewer than patients expect. One advantage of IV sedation is that multiple procedures can be combined into a single longer appointment, so treatment that might otherwise take five or six visits is often completed in one or two. Your sedation dentist maps the plan out at the consultation so you know the full scope before anything begins.

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You can start with a conversation. Nothing has to happen that day.If fear has kept you away — for two years or twenty-six — the first step is just talking it through. Tell us you are anxious when you call. We will take it from there. Call us at (954) 785-1100  ·  572 E McNab Rd, Suite 102, Pompano Beach, FL 33060