I'm so sorry, Linda. How scary.
Never heard of this. It does ring a bell though. Saw a cat a few weeks ago that had some weird swelling post dental. Ended up behind the eye. No tooth extract from up there, so there was no pathway for infection. It was so odd. Now I'm wondering if it was this and I just didn't catch the name.
I'd just have the anesthesiologist at A&M try and sort out what happened. No new/different drugs used before intubation? If your vet uses Iso, but A&M has Sevo. I'm sure they can figure out a way to keep him safe. That does seem very odd though.
I agree. Never be too afraid of dentals to get them done when they need to be. My vet does dentistry all the time. I'd say she deals with very few serious complications. And she didn't have any serious anesthetic problems for about 5 years straight. Make sure your vet has a good anesthetic protocol and has experience with dentistry and trust them with it.