Dental-UV

There are many ways of introducing pathogens in dental water. The incoming water supply from the city and building pipes is the main contamination source where biofilm builds-up, harbouring a colony of microorganisms as deadly pseudomonas inside the small diameter dental equipment water/air tubes is even a more serious threat to patient health.

Even if sterilized water is introduced, there remains a few dozen feet of tiny tubes making their circuits before reaching the end tool. Biofilm adhesion may begin in a few days and becomes impossible to remove from inside the flexible small diameter tubes, mechanically or chemically.

As the water flows through the biofilm covered tube, the biofilm slowly sheds pathogens and contaminating the water flow, thereby increasing the pathogen count per ml of water. As such, the longer the water flows through the tubing, the higher the pathogen count.

There have been many scientific approaches to eradicate biofilm by means of everything from chemicals and ultrasonic waves to ozonation, heating the water, and even drying the tubes overnight with compressed air. All of them so far resulted in failure according to latest ADA directive produced in 2015. The only conclusion was that eradicating biofilm was impossible once established.

According to the ADA, eradicating the biofilm is not the main objective, but rather to reduce the pathogen count below 200 pcs/ml, in order to reduce and eliminate the infection mainly for immune system-suppressed cancer patients, and the elderly and sick while receiving urgent dental treatment.

ADA established that if dental water is run continuously from every tool for at least 2 minutes every morning, and also every few hours during the day, the flow of water reduces the pathogen count well below 200 pcs/ml, so long as the dentist uses clean water to begin with throughout the water circuit.

Unfortunately, dental clinics do not find it easy to do this with existing equipment and a new system has been designed from the ground up — Denta-UV.