Protrusive Dental Podcast

Is it a fit appointment — or a try-in? (The word you choose changes the whole visit.)
Water try-in or try-in paste — and what do you do when minimal-prep veneers just won’t stay put?
Why does the last veneer in the sequence so often refuse to seat?
And how much excess cement is still hiding after you’ve cleaned up?
The bonding appointment is where a veneer case is won or lost on the day. In this episode, Dr Tejas Patel — a cosmetic dentist who runs a boutique, veneer-focused practice in Austin, Texas, with patients flying in from across the US — walks through his complete seat protocol: the checkpoints that should be closed before the patient arrives, the try-in, cement choice, the exact bonding and tacking order, clean-up and final checks. Then the troubleshooting: why veneers won’t seat, how to remove temporaries and old veneers without damaging teeth, and when it’s fine to go back to temps. One clinician’s tried-and-tested protocol — yours may differ, and that’s the point.

Protrusive Dental Pearl: Onlays Fail by Fracture — So Prevent It, and Repair It

The most common complication of a ceramic onlay or overlay isn’t debonding — it’s fracture. A systematic review of ceramic onlays found fracture was the leading cause of failure, followed by debonding and caries. Longevity was better where the preparation allowed at least 2 mm of occlusal ceramic, and risk rose further back in the mouth and with parafunction (though the wider literature on bruxism is mixed). So don’t skimp on occlusal reduction: the strength of the tooth comes from the gingival third, and sacrificing a little coronal structure to give the ceramic its ideal thickness is still far more conservative than a crown.
If a fracture does happen, and you can reach and isolate it, repair it rather than replace it. Bur-and-bond alone performs poorly: etch the exposed ceramic with hydrofluoric acid, then silane, then composite (the literature is mixed on adding a bonding agent first). Wary of HF in the mouth? A one-step etch-and-prime ceramic primer is the alternative. Then ask why it fractured — was the occlusal thickness there?

What You’ll Take From This Episode

The checkpoints before the day — what has to be approved, scanned and verified before the patient ever sits down.
Try-in, not fit — how framing the visit protects you and the patient when something isn’t right.
The bonding sequence — the order, the tack, and the trick that means you never bust a contact open with a bur.
Light-cure or dual-cure — which cement for porcelain, and what to judge any cement on.
When a veneer won’t seat — the troubleshooting checklist, and when to go back to temps.
Removing temps and old veneers — how to get them off without gouging a prep or fracturing a tooth.
Highlights of This Episode

00:00     TEASER
00:59     How to Bond Porcelain Veneers: The Seat Appointment
02:25     Ceramic Onlay Fracture: How to Prevent and Repair It
05:54     Why Veneer Cases Are Won or Lost on Communication
12:46     What to Check Before the Veneer Seat Appointment
17:59     Veneer Try-In vs Fit: How to Frame the Appointment
20:09     Veneer Try-In: Isolation, Tissue Control and Water Try-In
23:54     How to Choose Veneer Cement Shade With Your Patient
25:15     Veneer Bonding Step by Step: Etch, Bond, Tack and Floss
34:08     Cement Clean-Up, Radiographs and Final Checks After Veneers
39:30     Why a Veneer Won't Seat: Contacts and Insertion Sequence
43:20     Light-Cure vs Dual-Cure Cement for Porcelain Veneers
45:21     When Veneer Cases Need the Vertical Opened or Ortho First
47:22     How to Remove Veneer Temporaries Without Damaging the Prep
49:44     Common Veneer Seat Mistakes (and When to Go Back to Temps)
53:28     How to Remove Old Veneers Safely
57:39     OUTRO

From the Guest

Dr Tejas Patel runs a boutique, cosmetic-only practice in Austin, Texas, where he has practised for over 20 years. He teaches veneers through two main courses: the Veneer Blueprint Course, covering veneers from A to Z — including his bonding protocol and prep sequence — and a course on no-prep and prepless veneers.
👉  veneertraining.com — the Veneer Blueprint Course and the No Prep & Prepless Veneers Course

👉  @veneertraining on Instagram — veneer tips

References & Further Reading

Sources and further reading from this episode:
Abduo J, Sambrook RJ. Longevity of ceramic onlays: A systematic review. Journal of Esthetic and Restorative Dentistry, 2018;30(3):193–215. doi:10.1111/jerd.12384. Cited in the Pearl.

Want more?

If you enjoyed this episode, check out: How to Temporise Veneers Step by Step FULL GUIDE – PDP214

Going deeper on partial coverage? Onlays Shmonlays — the masterclass behind this episode’s Pearl — is on demand in Protrusive Guidance, in the masterclasses section. Access it throught the Ultimate Plan.
Tags

#PDPMainEpisodes #AdhesiveDentistry 

Listen, Subscribe, Earn CPD

Listen: Subscribe to the Protrusive Dental Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.
This episode is eligible for 1 CE credit via the quiz on Protrusive Guidance.
This episode meets GDC Outcomes C.
AGD Subject Code: 780 Esthetics/Cosmetic Dentistry.

Aim & Learning Outcomes

Aim: To give dental practitioners a structured, start-to-finish approach to the porcelain veneer bonding appointment — from pre-appointment checkpoints and try-in through cementation, clean-up and troubleshooting.
Learning Outcomes — by the end of this episode, dentists will be able to:

Describe the pre-appointment checkpoints — provisional approval, laboratory design review and model verification — that underpin a predictable veneer seat appointment.
Apply a structured try-in and bonding sequence for porcelain laminate veneers, including tissue management, insertion order, tack-curing and removal of excess cement.
Identify common causes of incomplete veneer seating and select an appropriate response, from contact adjustment to re-scanning or returning to provisionals.

Do you ever take your patients home with you — replaying the day, the difficult conversation, the distal margin you wish you’d sealed a little better?
Have you ever lost a night’s sleep over a case that went wrong?
Which parts of dentistry fill you with energy — and which quietly drain you?
And are you cutting corners you know about — and paying for it in job satisfaction?
This is Part 2 of my conversation with Dr Ronit Patel — a general dentist  with more than 20 years in practice, who built a referral book in endodontics and restorative dentistry and then, by design, flipped back to mostly general dentistry. Part 1 was about taking control of your diary. This part goes further: fuel versus friction, why general practice is the toughest and most fun job in dentistry, what to do when your diary has white space, and the conversation we don’t have enough — failures, complaints and sleepless nights, and how to bounce back. It stands on its own, but Part 1 is a great companion.

Protrusive Dental Pearls: Clean It, Hand It, Check It

This episode has three pearls instead of one — one clinical, one for your team, one for your systems.
1. Clean the teeth. Endodontics is chemo-mechanical: we accept that bacteria and biofilm are there, so we debride mechanically and disinfect chemically. Restorative dentistry deserves the same respect. Before placing a composite or fitting a crown, clean the tooth — pumice is the most accessible option, with ultrasonic scaling or air abrasion as alternatives. Disclose first so you can see what’s there, then clean until it’s gone. Everyone knows they should; it’s the step most often skipped, and it shows up later as staining around the margins.
2. Hand instruments with intention. In Japan, even a receipt is handed over with care and intention. Bring that to four-handed dentistry: the right instrument, the right way round, arriving with the weight and timing your hand expects. A seamless transfer is efficiency the patient can feel.
3. Give yourself checklists. Most missed steps aren’t a knowledge problem — you know what to do, and a step still gets skipped. Give yourself and your nurse checklists and pro formas. A new step that relies on you asking every time disappears the first day you forget. Write it into the checklist, and it becomes the system.

What You’ll Take From This Episode

Fuel vs friction — how to audit your whole working week and find the niche that energises you instead of draining you.
Keep sharpening the knife — why stagnation, not hard work, is the real burnout risk, and how to take on new skills mid-career.
Your day list is your revenue — the three-way test for where to niche, and why you shouldn’t panic-book the white space.
Bouncing back from failure — a real full-arch case that went wrong at the fit, and what actually helped.
The cognitive dissonance trap — the hidden reason so many dentists feel miserable, and the mentor lesson that changed how one endodontist practises.

Highlights of This Episode
00:00     TEASER
00:56     Sleepless Nights in Dentistry: Do You Take Patients Home?
03:39     How to Find Your Niche in Dentistry
06:06     Fuel vs Friction: Which Dentistry Drains You?
08:32     Referral Work vs General Practice: Why Continuity of Care Matters
10:15     Why General Dentistry Is the Toughest — and Most Fun — Job
12:04     Learning Surgical Dentistry Mid-Career
13:32     Avoiding Burnout: Keep Sharpening the Knife
15:27     Cherry-Picking Cases and Practising Authentically
18:52     Your Day List Is Your Revenue
21:35     Empty Diary Time: Why Not to Panic-Book
24:10     How to Cope With Clinical Failures and Sleepless Nights
29:27     Mentor Advice: Make the Parts Nobody Sees Beautiful
30:32     Cognitive Dissonance: Why Cutting Corners Makes Dentists Miserable
32:50     Why a Non-Judgemental Dental Community Matters
34:31     Three Dental Pearls: Clean Teeth, Four-Handed Dentistry, Checklists
38:12     OUTRO

From the Guest

Dr Ronit Patel is a general dental practitioner and associate at the White House Dental Clinic in Kew. His work spans endodontics, microscope-based restorative dentistry and, more recently, surgical dentistry, alongside general care for whole families. Inside Protrusive Guidance he records short video explanations answering members’ clinical cases.
👉  drronit.co.uk — Dr Ronit Patel

References & Further Reading

Sources and further reading from this episode:
Gawande A. The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right. Metropolitan Books, 2009. The distinction between errors of ignorance and errors of ineptitude behind the third pearl.
IC079 — Thoughts Become Things: How to Be Happier in Dentistry (with Neo Positivity) — on rumination and taking work stress home.

Want more?

If you enjoyed this episode, check out: “Why I Don’t Work August” — Designing a Career on Your Own Terms (Part 1) – PDP289

Tags

#PDPMainEpisodes #CareerDevelopment

Listen, Subscribe, Earn CPD

Listen: Subscribe to the Protrusive Dental Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.
This episode is eligible for 0.5 CE credit via the quiz on Protrusive Guidance.
This episode meets GDC Outcomes B.
AGD Subject Code: 770 Self-Improvement.

Aim & Learning Outcomes

Aim: To help dental practitioners build a sustainable, fulfilling career by recognising what energises and drains them, managing their diary and development deliberately, and recovering constructively from clinical setbacks.
Learning Outcomes — by the end of this episode, dentists will be able to:

Identify the clinical and non-clinical parts of their own practice that energise or drain them, and use this to guide decisions about focus, referral and further training.
Describe strategies for managing the emotional impact of clinical failures and complaints, including the role of peer support and mentorship.
Apply checklists and structured team protocols to reduce errors caused by omitted steps rather than by a lack of knowledge.

Is your diary running you — booked weeks ahead, no white space, drowning by Thursday?
Do you really have to specialise to get referrals?
How does an associate negotiate a month off every August — and get a yes?
And what changes when you start treating yourself as your most important instrument?
This is Part 1 of a two-part conversation with Dr Ronit Patel — a Richmond GDP of 20-odd years, an associate at the White House Dental Clinic in Kew, and one of the nicest and geekiest members of the Protrusive community. He works three and a half days a week, takes Wednesdays off, and typically takes the whole of August off. This episode is how he got there: staying a generalist when specialising beckoned, buying a microscope he wasn’t allowed to see, building a referral book without social media, and — the big one — taking control of the diary.
It’s a warm, reflective conversation rather than a technique masterclass, and Ronit is refreshingly honest that it hasn’t always been smooth. Part 2 goes into fuel versus friction: what fills you, and what drains you.

Protrusive Dental Pearl: Get Good, Then Get Passionate

“Follow your passion” is actually bad career advice. What most of us call passion is really interest. When you applied to dental school, you may have said you were passionate about dentistry and oral health — but you had barely scratched the surface. That wasn’t passion; that was flirting with the idea of dentistry. Then you married it, and disillusionment arrived: is this really what I signed up for?
Passion develops once you start to get good at something and you’re helping people — and dentistry has so many avenues to do both. You don’t become passionate first, then good. You become good, then passionate. So the better advice: become good at something, help people, develop a passion, and follow it through.

What You’ll Take From This Episode

The diary control sequence — four moves that turn a chaotic book into a business case: audit, price, zone, pitch.
Slack, rhythm and energy — why white space isn’t waste, and what time-of-day research means for when you book your hardest work.
The referral engine — how a handful of colleagues, not a social following, can fill a niche book.
Specialise or invest? — the decision filter for cutting your book, and how full it should really be.
Scripts for the principal conversation — the exact lines for asking for a zoned diary and protected time off.

Highlights of This Episode
00:00     TEASER
00:59     How to Take Control of Your Dental Career (Without Quitting)
03:33     Dental Pearl: Why "Follow Your Passion" Is Bad Career Advice
07:57     Generalist vs Specialist: Why Stay a General Dentist?
11:26     Buying a Dental Microscope as an Associate
14:50     How to Get Endo Referrals as a Non-Specialist
21:49     Why Word of Mouth Beats Social Media for Referrals
26:59     How to Audit and Zone Your Dental Diary
29:51     Morning vs Afternoon: Decision Fatigue in Dentistry
32:22     What Is Slack in Your Diary? (And Why You Need It)
37:01     How Associates Can Negotiate Diary Control
45:50     Creating Scarcity: Building a Referral Funnel
48:30     Why Every Dentist Needs a Mentor or Coach
51:49     How to Negotiate Time Off as an Associate
57:48     Going Part-Time as a Dentist: The Real Trade-Offs
1:06:27   How Far Ahead Should Your Diary Be Booked?

From the Guest

Dr Ronit Patel is a general dental practitioner and associate at the White House Dental Clinic in Kew, where his book is now largely referrals — endodontics, restorative work under the microscope, and the tricky cases other dentists have become stuck with. Before that, he was a clinical lead for a corporate group, mentoring dentists across the South of England.
In the community: members of Protrusive Guidance will already know Ronit from his short, helpful clinical videos inside the app. No courses, books or social channels were promoted on this episode — fittingly, for a referral practice built without social media.

References & Further Reading

Books and research mentioned in this episode:
Kleitman N. Sleep and Wakefulness (rev. ed., 1963). The ~90-minute basic rest–activity cycle, proposed to continue through waking hours (daytime evidence is still debated).
Kahneman D, Sibony O, Sunstein CR. Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment (2021).
Pink DH. When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing (2018).
Danziger S, Levav J, Avnaim-Pesso L. Extraneous factors in judicial decisions. PNAS, 2011;108(17):6889–6892. The parole-decisions-and-food-breaks study.
Newport C. Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout (2024).
Maltz M. Psycho-Cybernetics (1960).

Want more?

If you enjoyed this episode, check out: Better Dentistry Through Compassion (Not Just Technique) – IC073

Tags

#PDPMainEpisodes #CareerDevelopment #BeyondDentistry

Listen, Subscribe, Earn CPD

Listen: Subscribe to the Protrusive Dental Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.
This episode is eligible for 1 CE credit via the quiz on Protrusive Guidance.
This episode meets GDC Outcomes B.
AGD Subject Code: 550 Practice Management and Human Relations.

Aim & Learning Outcomes

Aim: To help dental practitioners take deliberate control of their clinical diary and career design — using audit data, scheduling principles and professional networks — so they can sustain high-quality care, develop a clinical niche and protect their own wellbeing.
Learning Outcomes — by the end of this episode, dentists will be able to:

Describe how auditing an appointment book and calculating the hourly value of each appointment type can be used to zone a clinical diary and build a business case for changes to working patterns.
Explain how planned slack and time-of-day considerations in scheduling can protect clinician energy, decision quality and patient care.
Identify strategies for developing a non-specialist referral niche through professional networks, incremental skill development and case audit.

Ever felt like being a good clinician is just the entry fee?
Have you got an idea you’ve been sitting on — and no one telling you to go for it?
Practice ownership, a side business, or staying a happy associate: how do you know which is right for you?
And when you tell a patient the fee… do you stay silent, or start talking?
This is an Interference Cast — a non-clinical episode designed purely to inspire. My guest, Dr Jawad Abbas, is a young associate who’s already building two ventures alongside his clinical work: an AI tool for radiographic analysis and treatment-plan communication, and a luxury oral-care brand. We start with the communication skills that turn patient trust into comprehensive care — then dig into what it really takes to build something of your own, and whether you even should.
We’re living through a moment where, if you can think it, you can increasingly build it. If there’s a big enough problem out there and you have a good solution for it, this episode might be the spark you needed.

Protrusive Dental Pearl: Say the Fee, Then Stay Silent

When you present a treatment fee, say the number clearly — then stop talking. Don’t justify it, don’t over-explain, don’t rush to fill the gap. The pause feels endless to you, but for the patient it passes in a second or two, because they’re busy doing the mental maths: what’s in savings, what the monthly commitments look like, whether they can make it work. Give them that space.
What undermines a fee is rarely the number; it’s the delivery. Closing your eyes as you say it, your voice rising in pitch, launching straight into justification, or avoiding it altogether and letting the patient discover it at reception all signal that you’re not sure of your own fee. Remember what sits behind it — your training, and what your surgery costs to run every hour — and say it like you mean it.

What You’ll Take From This Episode
Four communication habits that build trust — from asking what matters to matching your information to the decision-maker.
The cost of doing nothing — how to make an unconcerning problem an informed choice, without selling.
What a fee actually covers — the one question every associate should ask their principal.
The three hats — entrepreneur, manager or technician, and why so few people wear all three well.
From problem to prototype — five steps to test a business idea before you sink money into it.
The decision filter — six honest questions to tell you whether building something of your own is right for you.

Highlights of This Episode
00:00     TEASER
00:59     Entrepreneurship in Dentistry: Why Now Is Different
07:14     Patient Communication: Ask What Matters to Them
10:39     How to Explain the Cost of Doing Nothing
14:19     Short-, Medium- and Long-Term Treatment Plans
16:57     Fast-Lane vs Slow-Lane Patients: Personality Types
20:09     How to Present Your Dental Fees With Confidence
24:07     How Profitable Is a UK Dental Practice?
26:29     Why Dentists Become Entrepreneurs
31:08     Associate, Principal or Entrepreneur?
36:19     The E-Myth for Dentists: Which Hat Do You Wear?
41:09     Building an AI Treatment-Planning Tool
44:06     How to Validate a Business Idea Before You Build It
49:51     Creating a Luxury Mouthwash Brand
53:24     How to Find a Business Idea — In or Out of Dentistry
58:54     Dentistry as Your Safety Net: Starting a Side Business
1:04:58   OUTRO
From the Guest

Dr Jawad Abbas graduated from the University of Manchester and is completing a diploma in restorative and aesthetic dentistry at Smile Dental Academy, while working as an associate in Ipswich and Peterborough. Alongside clinical work, he’s developing two ventures, both at prototype stage: an AI tool that flags decay and presents tiered treatment options as a communication aid, and Jawdouré, a luxury fragrance-led mouthwash brand. During foundation training he wrote for dentistry.co.uk about the anxiety of charging for treatment.
👉  @jaw.dental on Instagram — questions and messages welcome

References & Further Reading

Books, brands and episodes mentioned in this episode:
Gerber ME. The E-Myth Revisited. The source of the entrepreneur / manager / technician model. A dentistry edition also exists: Gerber ME, Kwong Hing A, Barrow C. The E-Myth Dentist. Michael E. Gerber Companies, 2014.
Erikson T. Surrounded by Idiots: The Four Types of Human Behaviour. The four-colour personality model discussed in the communication section.
Squibb S. What’s Your Dream? Penguin, 2024.
MAISON de SABRÉ — the luxury leather-goods brand founded in Sydney in 2017 by brothers Omar and Zane Sabré, who trained as dentists.
Previous Protrusive episodes: Dr Colin Campbell on consent and personality types (PDP265); Professor Avijit Banerjee on caries management (PDP269).

Want more?

If you enjoyed this episode, check out: How to Find a Mentor in 5 Seconds Flat! – IC058

Tags

#InterferenceCast #CareerDevelopment #BeyondDentistry #Communication

Listen & Subscribe

Listen: Subscribe to the Protrusive Dental Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.
This episode is not eligible for CPD/CE — but most of our episodes are. Find them, and earn your CPD, inside Protrusive Guidance.

Beyond Scaling: How to Get More From Your Ultrasonic

Do you really need your ultrasonic on 100%? (Probably not — and it may be costing you precision.)
Which part of the tip should actually be touching the tooth — and is that why the hygienists keep complaining about blunt tips?
Could the scaler tip you already own refine your margins, find a calcified canal and cut gutta-percha like a hot knife through butter?
And if you’re in the market for a new unit, which features are actually worth paying for?
Every dentist uses an ultrasonic — but most of us use it as a perio tool and nothing more. In this episode, Dr Hussain Hassanali, a general dentist who has gone properly geeky on ultrasonics, walks through how they really remove tooth tissue and how to put them to work in restorative dentistry and endo. It’s foundational, practical, and full of things you can try at your next session. Jaz’s biggest takeaway? Stop whacking the power up to 100%.

Protrusive Dental Pearl: Trim Gutta-Percha With Your Scaler Tip

You’ve just obturated a canal and need to remove the excess gutta-percha. The old ways: heat a ball burnisher in the flame until it glows red (that smell, and the GP smearing everywhere — or lifting out entirely because the sealer hasn’t set), or sink a long-neck bur into the GP while it spins and hope you don’t gouge the dentine.
Instead, take your bog-standard ultrasonic scaler tip, turn the water off, and set the power to around 10%. Sweep it across the orifice and it cuts through gutta-percha like a hot knife through butter — the water is off because here you want the heat. Then drop the power right down (around 2%) and gently compact the coronal GP, leaving roughly 1–1.5 mm of space for your restorative material to lock into the orifice. No flame, no burn risk, and a thin tip that doesn’t block your view. Try it once and you won’t go back to heated pluggers.

What You’ll Take From This Episode

The three rules of the ultrasonic — why it abrades rather than cuts, why the side of the tip beats the pointed end, and why power is a dial, not a switch.
A settings guide by task — where to start for enamel margins, fissures, soft dentine, endo access and gutta-percha.
Standard tip or specialist tip? — when the tip you already own is enough, and when diamond-coated tips earn their place.
Water on or water off? — the two endo jobs where the water has to go off.
Buying an ultrasonic — piezo versus magnetostrictive, and the one feature that changes patient comfort.

Highlights of This Episode
00:00     TEASER
00:59     Ultrasonic Scaler Tips Every Dentist Should Know
04:30     Why Ultrasonics Are Underused in General Dentistry
07:08     What Power Setting to Use When Cleaning Enamel Margins
09:28     Which Part of the Ultrasonic Tip Should You Use?
11:34     Ultrasonic Power Settings for Occlusal Fissures
13:47     Piezoelectric vs Magnetostrictive Scalers: Does It Matter?
21:37     Ultrasonics for PRRs, Fissure Sealants and Anxious Children
28:36     Selective Caries Removal With an Ultrasonic
30:42     Refining Crown and Onlay Margins With Ultrasonic Tips
39:02     Ultrasonics in Endo: Irrigant Activation and Finding Canals
45:35     How to Trim Gutta-Percha With an Ultrasonic
51:37     The Most Common Ultrasonic Mistake: Too Much Power
54:29     What to Look for When Buying an Ultrasonic Scaler
57:39     Are Ultrasonic Scalers Safe With Pacemakers?
1:00:55   Cementing Onlays With Heated Composite: Do Ultrasonic Tips Help?
01:09:01  OUTRO

From the Guest
Dr Hussein Hassanali is a dentist at Thorpe Dental Group and Implant Suite in York. He qualified from the University of Liverpool in 2009, completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Restorative and Aesthetic Dentistry in 2020, and is particularly passionate about preventative and minimally invasive dentistry — which is what led him down the ultrasonics rabbit hole. He is happy to answer specific questions, and he’s open to building a hands-on course if there’s demand.
👉  Dr Hussein Hassanali at Thorpe Dental Group, York

Want more?

If you enjoyed this episode, check out: No More Air Polishing or Prophy Paste! Revolutionary New Technique for Non Mechanical Prophylaxis – PDP284

Tags

#PDPMainEpisodes #EndoRestorative

Listen, Subscribe, Earn CPD

Listen: Subscribe to the Protrusive Dental Podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.
This episode is eligible for 1 CE credit via the quiz on Protrusive Guidance.
This episode meets GDC Outcomes C.
AGD Subject Code: 250 Operative (Restorative) Dentistry.

Aim & Learning Outcomes

Aim: To broaden dental practitioners’ use of the ultrasonic scaler beyond periodontal debridement, by explaining how ultrasonic instruments remove tooth tissue and how to apply them precisely and safely in restorative and endodontic procedures.
Learning Outcomes — by the end of this episode, dentists will be able to:

Describe how ultrasonic instruments remove tooth tissue by abrasion, and explain what this means for selective removal, tip orientation and power setting.
Apply appropriate power, water and tip choices to restorative uses of the ultrasonic, including margin finishing, fissure preparation for preventive resin restorations and selective caries removal.
Use ultrasonics safely in endodontics — for irrigant activation, canal location, scouting and gutta-percha trimming — and identify precautions for patients with cardiac implantable devices.