Preoperative Anxiety Before Paediatric Dental Rehabilitation Under General Anaesthesia: Associations with Accompanying Parent Characteristics and Caries Experience

Background/Objectives: Preoperative anxiety may complicate the delivery of comprehensive dental rehabilitation under general anaesthesia, yet evidence regarding child–parent anxiety relationships and dental disease burden in paediatric dental settings is limited. To evaluate children’s preoperative anxiety and its associations with accompanying parents’ state and trait anxiety, parent characteristics and dental caries experience. Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in a tertiary dental hospital in Istanbul, Türkiye, and included 61 children aged 3–9 years with ASA physical status I–II who were undergoing dental rehabilitation under general anaesthesia and their accompanying parents. Child anxiety was assessed immediately before transfer to the operating room using the Modified Yale Preoperative Anxiety Scale; parental anxiety was assessed using the State–Trait Anxiety Inventory. Caries experience was recorded using dmft/DMFT indices. Non-parametric group comparisons and Spearman correlation analyses were performed. Results: The mean child anxiety score was 51.37 ± 21.08. Children accompanied by fathers had higher scores than those accompanied by mothers (p = 0.018), and children accompanied by parents older than 35 years had higher scores than those accompanied by younger parents (p = 0.037). Fathers had higher state anxiety scores than mothers (p = 0.008). No significant correlations were observed between child anxiety and parental state or trait anxiety, or between caries experience and child or parental anxiety (all p > 0.05). Conclusions: No significant relationship was observed between parental anxiety and children’s preoperative anxiety. However, children accompanied by fathers and parents older than 35 years had higher preoperative anxiety scores.