What is the noise? What was that? – Patients will often ask these question before or after the use of a dental device called the dental ultrasonic.
The Dental Clean: Ultrasonic
One of the first stages of a dental clean is the use of a device called an ultrasonic. An ultrasonic is a hand piece tool with different tips that is used to clean around the tooth surface. The ultrasonic vibrates at around 25,000 – 42,000 cycles per minute; with such a high vibration frequency, a water spray is used during its use to ensure the tip of the device is kept cool. Further, the use of the water helps to wash away the debris.
The ultrasonic works very well to clean the hard and soft deposits off the tooth (teeth) surface(s). In years gone-by, the main method to clean the tooth surface would have involved hand-scalers – a sharp curved instruments used to manually debride the deposits of the wall of the tooth (teeth). Hand scalers are still used today for select cases, depending on the tooth and location of the deposits.
There are two main ultrasonic devices, one is called a piezoelectric – the movements of this ultrasonic is from side to side. The
other ultrasonic is a magnetostrictive which moves in an elliptical movement.
Further uses:
Originally the ultrasonic was designed to remove decay, which it is still capable of doing; however not as efficiently as a dental high or slow drill and eventually found its niche for cleaning the gums.
However, the ultrasonic is still used in conjunction with the drills to help ensure a tooth is decay free and clean of any contamination or loose debris.
Another use of a dental ultrasonic is in endodontics or root canal therapy. Root canal therapy involves isolating and cleaning inside of the tooth; in some cases canals can be very small and the use of an ultrasonic with a specially designed tip is utilised to help identify canals.
If you wish for more information on ultrasonics, cleans, or root canals please do not hesitate to contact Skygate Dental today on (07) 3114 1199 or 0406 579 197.