Dental treatment under general anesthesia in patients with severe intellectual disability at the Gregorio Marañón General University Hospital: a 10-year retrospective study.

This article presents a 10-year retrospective observational study analyzing dental treatments performed under general anesthesia on 1,845 adult patients with severe intellectual disability (ID) at the Gregorio Marañón General University Hospital in Madrid from 2009 to 2019. The study aimed to identify the types of dental procedures carried out, patient characteristics (age, sex, type of disability), and the feasibility of clinical and radiographic examinations prior to treatment. Results showed that preventive care (ultrasonic scaling) was the most frequent treatment, followed by dental extractions, restorative treatments, and surgical procedures, with older patients requiring more extractions and surgeries and fewer restorations. Approximately 52.6% of patients did not tolerate clinical or radiographic examinations due to lack of cooperation, and patients with unspecified types of ID exhibited similar oral health conditions to those with known disabilities. The study highlights the need for specialized dental care under general anesthesia for this population and calls for standardized future research to better understand their dental care needs.