Facile Reduction of Aerosol Emission From Ultrasonic Dental Scalers

Objectives: Ultrasonic dental scalers are widely-used devices for effective and efficient dental hygiene treatment.
However, their operation entails evolution of copious amounts of aerosols that may contaminate air and surfaces with air-borne pathogens, reduce visibility for the operator and be displeasurable for the treated patient.
Avoiding or reducing such aerosol emission is thus desirable for safe and convenient dental hygiene treatment.
This study investigated the effects of a newly developed biocompatible aerosol-reduction-irrigation-solution on aerosol emissions from a commercially available piezo-electric ultrasonic scaler.
Methods: An unmodified dental scaler (PIEZON 250, EMS) was operated with an PS insert (EMS) in an enclosed environment using a reference of dilute saline (DS; 4g/L NaCl) and aerosol-reduction-irrigation solution (ARIS) as sample. The aerosol-production-rate [N_Particles/s], and particle-size-distribution was measured in the range of 10nm – 10 my using a Condensation-Particle-Counter CPC-3775 (TSI), a Scanning-Mobility-Particle-Sizer SMPS (TSI) and an Optical-Particle-Counter Fidas-100 (Palas).
Aerosol developed from both liquids at half power (scaler-setting “5”) and full power (“10”) is given in Table 1 and the ARIS-induced reduction in particle-production-rate expressed.
Results: For both liquids, the particle-size-distribution ranged 10-500nm, with only few particles >1my. No influence of the liquid on particle-size-distribution was discernible.
Conclusions: While this study does not consider parameters of intraoral operation, such as saliva, debris or microbial load, a highly positive effect of aerosol-reduction-irrigation-solution on aerosol production rate could be observed. Aerosol production-rate corresponded to power-setting, with a reduction of up to 99.94% being achieved in a clinically relevant setting.
A corresponding reduction in airborne pathogens may be expected. It is furthermore anticipated that the observed effect has a positive effect on operator’s field of vision and the convenience of the patient.