Dental Appliance For Abrading Dental Resin

Resins rather than amalgams are now predominately used for filling cavities or other dental decay and/or as a general dental restorative supplies. These resins possess properties that closely match natural teeth with respect to structural properties such as cohesive strength, coefficient of thermal expansion and wearability. Also, aesthetic considerations such as color stability, refractive index, plaque repellency, polishability and opacity are important factors make resins a good choice as a dental restorative material.

These composite resins have good forming characteristics so that they can be shaped to fit a cavity area or molded into place in order to repair chipped or damaged teeth. However, it is necessary to shape the repaired area by polishing or sanding the resin once the resin is cured. For instance, when resin is placed in the interproximal surface of posterior teeth such as for fixing a cavity, a matrix band is used so that the resin does not bond to the adjacent tooth. As a result, resin can overflow past the margin of the floor of the cavity preparation causing an overhang of composite resin that can create periodontal disease due to inflamed gingival or recurrent decay. Because it is optimal to create a tight, dense contact between the composite resin and the tooth in order to prevent a food trap.

One of the ways to remove a composite resin overhang is to use a scalpel such as a size 11 scalpel. This is not always effective and can traumatize the gum tissue. Another way to remove a composite resin overhang and composite resin in general is to sand it with an abrasive. Abrasive removal is currently accomplished using a plastic dental strip (i.e. a rectangular plastic sheet) that has a polishing material thereon. These sheet plastic strips however, are not ideal. If one uses a sheet plastic dental strip and micro moteur for polishing, the strip will crease and therefore be unable to fit through the tight contact around the resin overhang, thereby rendering the strip useless. Another manner of accomplishing abrading is by using a metal strip that has a polishing material thereon. However, if one uses a metal strip for polishing, the metal does not contour to the curvature of the tooth and thus strips the contact thereby creating a food trap (e.g. food getting caught between the teeth). Moreover, with metal polishing strips, the gum tissue is more likely to be cut or shred.

While, as noted above, there are various dental polishing devices, they are deficient in their ability to be easily introduced into the interproximal area between two teeth and to abrade dental resin.