Teaching medical students and residents how to inject local anesthesia almost painlessly

Abstract

The objective of the present study was to determine whether it is possible to consistently and reliably teach medical students and resident learners how to administer local anesthetics in an almost painless manner. Using the published technique, 25 consecutive medical students and residents were taught how to inject local anesthetics for carpal tunnel release by watching the senior author perform the technique once. The learner then independently administered the anesthesia to the next patient who then scored the learner's ability to inject the local anesthetic from a pain perspective. The teaching technique is demonstrated in an accompanying online video. The learners were consistently capable of administering local anesthetics with minimal pain. During the injection process, the patients only felt pain once (‘hole-in-one’) 76% of the time. This pain was attributed to the first 27-gauge needle poke. The other 24% of the time, patients felt pain twice (eagle) during the 5 min injection process. All 25 patients rated the entire pain experience to be less than 2/10. Eighty-four per cent of the patients indicated that the experience was better than local anesthetic given at the dentist's office. Medical students and residents can quickly and reliably learn how to administer local anesthesia for carpal tunnel release with minimal pain to the patient.