The Modern Dental Office - A Decade in Review
Dental Water Line Safety
If you haven't been to the dentist in the past ten years you will be very surprised by the changes in delivering dental care to our patients. Nearly every part of the dental experience has changed to make it more comfortable for the patient. Even the dreaded needle is a little easier to take! Dental anesthesia is now being delivered by a computer controlled device called The Wand. This almost painless method of delivery will make even the most anxious patient breath a sigh of relief. With new methods of detection we are also able to treat decay at such an early stage that we may be able to skip the anesthesia entirely. The DIAGNOdent laser is designed so that we can shine a laser onto the tooth's surface and measure it's density. This helps us find decay at it's earliest stages and we can find some decay that we were unable to easily locate before. When decay is spotted early on it is possible to treat it without freezing and use of the drill. Air Abrasion technology has provided the dental professional with an alternative to the drill that is almost painless and very conservative. We can even look inside your mouth with a small camera that shows us your teeth on a television screen (Intraoral Camera). You may not want your teeth to be "stars" but it does help in the diagnosis process when the dentist can see your mouth greatly enlarged!
So as you can see, times have changed! All of these changes are designed to make the patient more comfortable and help us to do our job more conservatively.
Dental water lines have long been a problem area for bacteria growth. Recently the severity of the problem has been fully recognized and the dental community is stepping up to do something about it.
What should we be concerned about?
At the end of a working day or at the end of a work week the very small plastic tubing that carries the water through the dental instruments is left with water sitting in it. At this time the bacteria is given the chance to form and multiply. This doesn't happen in household or commercial water lines very often because the water is transported through large lines at a very high flow rate. The copper pipes in you r home or office are very smooth which make it very difficult for a biofilm to form. However the dental lines offer the perfect breeding ground for a hazardous biofilm.
What is being done for my protection?
At Glenora Dental (and many dental offices) a disinfectant is being run through the lines at the end of each working day. This solution will fill the lines for the duration of nonuse and not allow this biofilm to form. At the start of each day the lines will be flushed with pure, clean, healthy city treated water. The disinfectant that we use is perfectly healthy and biodegradable so that it will not harm you or the environment.
Read about some of the other modern innovations in our office on the Archived
Stories page.
Updated: 10/18/2007