Dental Surgical Instruments for Periodontics & Surgery

Any signs of damage, even when it is tiny, can mean that your dental surgical instruments can no longer be used. The way this type of equipment can get damaged differs depending on how it is used and the quality of storage. 

Usually, high-quality instruments can be wrapped and stored for up to a year. However, this is only possible when vacuum sealing is used to prevent air from reaching the dental equipment. In most cases, periodontal instruments show the following signs of damage:

• Corrosion
• Bent or broken tips
• Cracks
• Worn/thin blades
• Dull edges

In the case of a dull edge, it can be very difficult to see that a blade is no longer sharp just by looking at it, which is why you may need a specific routine to check for the sharpness of all your instruments before use.

The last thing you want is to aid in the formation of a biofilm on the surface of your periodontal and surgical instruments. 

Such bacteria can be very hard to remove once it gets stuck. Therefore, leaving dirty equipment to stand overnight is not a good idea.

The usual recommendation is that all used dental instruments should be cleaned soon after the procedure is completed. If there are some hard-to-remove stains on the instruments, you can soak them in some distilled water with some enzymatic detergent that is at a neutral pH. However, never soak them overnight.

In ideal storage conditions, studies have found that autoclaved dental instruments can be kept safely for up to 98 weeks. However, this depends on the type of packaging that is used. Ideally, it should not be handled too much.

Double-wrap linen packs, or those with a paper layer inside and a plastic one on the outside, have proven to be some of the best types of packaging to give autoclaved instruments a long shelf life. 

There are a lot of different periodontal instruments that are available for use, so choosing the right one can be quite a process. However, the good thing is each one is designed for a specific purpose, which makes selection easier when you know what you want to achieve.

Some of the procedures that can be done using such instruments include surgery, polishing, cleaning, periodontal endoscopy, curetting, root planing, scaling, and diagnostics. Besides the purpose of the tool, you also need to consider the type of material used to make it, the angle at which the shank bends, its balance, flexibility, and durability.