The Minister of Health proposes that dental interventions with general anesthesia be moved to public hospitals, after the death of the two-year-old girl at a clinic in Bucharest

The Minister of Health, Alexandru Rogobete, announced on Friday evening that he is considering regulating the possibility that dental interventions that require general anesthesia be performed in public hospitals, in specialized outpatient clinics. The proposal comes after a two-year-old girl died on Thursday at a dental clinic in the center of Bucharest, where she was given total sedation.

“Seeing your reactions in the last few days and listening to the people around me – patients, doctors, specialists, friends – I have an idea. And before I go any further, I want to consult with you.

How would you like it if we regulated the possibility that certain dental interventions that require general anesthesia be performed in public emergency hospitals – in the specialized outpatient clinic to be exact?

I am referring to dental interventions with general anesthesia, carried out under safe conditions, in dental offices established in the outpatient clinics of public hospitals”, wrote Rogobete in a post on Facebook.

The minister says that the model could be settled by the National Health Insurance House, in an outpatient or day hospitalization regime: “I don't claim that it can be done overnight, but I think we can start this way so that, gradually, we offer patients access to safe, modern procedures, in hospitals prepared for such interventions and especially prepared if an emergency complication occurs.”

The case of the 2-year-old girl who died at a dental clinic

A 2-year-old girl died on Thursday, following a cardio-respiratory arrest, while she was in a dental office in Sector 3 of the Capital. The child had a “complex pre-existing chronic pathology”, according to the preliminary conclusions of the autopsy, sent by the Prosecutor's Office of the Bucharest Court.

The girl was treated in a second location of the clinic, opposite the main building, and the anesthesia cabinet does not “respect the regulations and legislation in force”, declared, on Friday, the Minister of Health, Alexandru Rogobete, specifying that these are preliminary data following the control launched at the clinic by the State Sanitary Inspection.

Alexandru Rogobete said that, although he does not have a final report, “from what I know from my team on the spot, there are spaces that do not comply with the regulations and legislation in force regarding the operation of an office that provides intravenous anesthesia, that does general anesthesia outside the hospital”:

The representatives of the dental clinic say, in a press release, that the girl went through a similar procedure, with deep sedation, on January 27, 2025, performed in the same clinic by the same medical team, anesthetist and dentist, a procedure that ended “without complications and with a full recovery”.

Cinica emphasized, in a statement sent on Friday, that over 1,700 procedures involving sedation were carried out over 11 years by the same anesthesiologist under whose care the 2-year-old child was and he recorded no incidents.

“Until the completion of the official investigation, we refrain from any speculation or conclusions. We will provide additional information as soon as it can be publicly communicated, in accordance with the legal provisions and the principles of transparency,” Crystal Dental Clinic representatives sent.