ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: The objective of this review was to evaluate the effect of non-thermal atmospheric plasma (NTAP) on adhesives resin-dentin micro-tensile bond strength (µTBS) in previously published studies. METHODS: Electronic search was conducted using the Medline, Cochrane library, and Scopus databases. The included studies were laboratory studies that investigated the effect of NTAP on adhesives µTBS to coronal dentin. Studies that evaluated the effect of NTAP on bond strength to indirect substrates, enamel or root dentin, were excluded. The methodological quality of included studies was assessed. RESULTS: Thirteen studies were included in this systematic review. All the included studies were considered to have a medium risk of bias. NTAP significantly improved µTBS at 24 h or after short-term aging in five studies (38.5%) and both immediate and after long-term aging in 5 studies (38.5%). In two studies (15.4%), NTAP resulted in a short-term material-dependent effect that was not stable after long-term aging. Interestingly, in one study (7.7%), NTAP had a positive effect only in the etch-and-rinse (ER) mode after long-term aging. CONCLUSION: Within the limitations of this systematic review, NTAP application could enhance resin-dentin µTBS of ER adhesives or universal adhesives (UAs) applied in the ER mode. In the ER mode, the rewetting step after NTAP seems to be unnecessary. Because of the limited information currently available in the literature, further studies are required to evaluate the effect of the NTAP application on self-etch (SE) adhesives or UAs applied in the SE mode.
ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: Various types of oral hygiene measures have been practiced by different populations around the world, as there is difference in the oral hygiene products including toothpicks and toothpowders. Miswak or tooth cleaning stick, for mechanical tooth cleaning, can be traced back at least to pre-Islamic times. Currently, many of the world populations still use chewing sticks as the single method for tooth brushing. The present study was done to study the incidence and prevalence of caries among Miswak and non-Miswak users. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study was done consisting of 120 cases and 120 control group (60 boys and 60 girls in each group) from the secondary school. The materials used were light, explorer, mirror, gloves, upper and lower teeth models, Miswak, and common toothbrush. After the recording of the primary data, Miswak was given to case group and the students were trained to use it on the teeth models. After 2 years, the examination of the teeth was done using the same method as before start of the study and by the same investigators. All the data were recorded, tabulated, and analyzed with the help of Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) statistics version 17 using Student's t-test. RESULTS: From the 240 participants, only 211 had continued the study for the total period of time. Out of these, 111 were from the study group and 100 from the control group. On comparison of the decayed-missing-filled (DMF) index scores of the study and control groups, before and after completion of the study, had also shown that the caries index was increased and the difference was found to be statistically significant. CONCLUSION: From the study, it can be concluded that the study group using Miswak had less number of caries incidence than the control group of non-Miswak. CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE: Miswak can be used as teeth cleaning aid in day-to-day life as it can reduce the caries incidence.
