Laurence is a copywriter and trained journalist. His passion is creating insightful and educational content for dental professionals of every level. Outside of work, he enjoys watching sport, quizzing and spending time with his family.
What Are Fibre Optic Handpieces?
Most modern handpieces now have an artificial light situated at the tip near the dental bur. The primary job of this light is to illuminate the cutting surface and assist with intra-operative vision. Fibre optic technology itself involves the transmission of light through long, thin fibres of glass or transparent plastic material around 0.01mm in diameter. This is roughly one third of the size of a strand of human hair. Without transmitting or generating heat, the light travels through the fibres, which are grouped together to form a fibre optic bundle, along the same line as the bur.
Fibre optics handpieces can use either self-sufficient LED illumination or an external fibre optic lighting system. Activation of the fibre optic light is typically achieved through touch or an air-electric switch.
When Can Fibre Optics Be Used for?
There is a long of list of dental procedures that can benefit from the use of fibre optics.
Applications for handpiece fibre optic transillumination include:
- General inspection of the oral cavity
- Identifying inter-proximal caries
- Calculus detection
- Evaluation of stained margins of composite resins
- Illuminating endodontic access and root canal orifices
- Soft-tissue lesions evaluation
- Inspecting of restorations to rule out fractures
- Evaluation of staining depth
- Identifying grazing and hair line cracks in teeth
- Locating excess cement
BA International
Our best-selling range of ergonomic and innovative handpieces
What Are the Benefits of Fibre Optic Handpieces
Along with the long list of clinical procedures fibre optic illumination can aid in, outlined above, one of the big advantages of fibre optics is reliability. Fibre optic transillumination is a proven diagnosis tool that has been tried and tested over many years and which does not require the support of digital technology.
Many fibre optic handpieces are fully autoclavable. To prevent any diminishing of the light transmission, it is recommended that external fibre optic systems be wiped cleaned prior to sterilisation to remove debris and handpiece lubrication. It is always best practice to follow the handpiece manufacturer guide for cleaning and maintenance. We have partnered with BA International to offer a handpiece maintenance service to ensure your handpieces are always operating at their peak performance.
Fibre Optic Handpiece Prices
The price of your fibre optic handpiece will depend on what type of system it uses. Those with self-powered LED lighting are significantly more expensive than those that rely on an external fibre optic system that fits into the handpiece.
The popularity of non-LED fibre optic handpieces is their budget friendly price in comparison to LED whilst still offering a long working life and minimal heat production. Used by more than 100,000 dentists around the world, BA handpieces are Kent Express’ number one selling fibre optic handpiece brand. BA dental handpieces with or without fibre optics are regularly on special offer with next day delivery when you shop online for additional savings.
A simple definition of CAD/CAM dentistry is the use of digital software to design and manufacture dental restorations and prostheses. CAD stands for computer-aided design and CAM stands for computer-aided manufacturing. The technology can be used to create crowns, dentures, inlays, onlays, bridges and veneers among other things. The speed of the CAD/CAM process allows for dental prosthetics to be designed, manufactured and delivered to the patient in quick time, sometimes the same day. The wider system of using computer assisted technologies to produce restorations is known as CEREC (Chairside Economical Restoration of Aesthetic Ceramics).
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