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Tricks of the trade: patient friendly elastic applicator

From Volume 12, Issue 2, April 2019 | Page 77

Authors

Akansha Bansal

Postgraduate student, Professor and Head of Department, Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopaedics, SDM College of Dental Sciences, Dharwad, India

Articles by Akansha Bansal

Email Akansha Bansal

Roopak D Naik

BDS, MDS

Reader, Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopaedics, SDM College of Dental Sciences and Hospital, Sattur, Dharwad – 580 009 Karnataka, India

Articles by Roopak D Naik

Anand K Patil

BDS, MDS, MOrth RCS(Edinb)

Professor and Head, Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics, SDM College of Dental Sciences, Sattur, Dharwad, Karnataka 580009, India

Articles by Anand K Patil

Article

A successful orthodontic treatment goes hand in hand with patient compliance and clinician skills. One of the most difficult tasks in orthodontics for patients is engaging elastics, which often leads to poor patient compliance and frustration. Thus the present article describes a patient friendly elastic engager for easy insertion of elastics by adopting a humble technique of engaging elastics without demanding too much effort by the patient.

Settling elastics forms an indispensable part of orthodontic treatment, ranging its uses from intermaxillary anchorage to settling occlusion in the finishing stage. Therefore, for successful orthodontic treatment, the settling of occlusion and efficiency of wearing elastics go together.

Complexity of the configuration of elastics depends on the requirement of the case. Many patients engage with little effort but, at times during complex elastic engagement, patient compliance becomes questionable.

Success of any orthodontic treatment depends on a well finished occlusion, which in turn depends on engagement of elastics in proper configuration. Due to inaccessibility and lack of proper visibility in the posterior region, patients end up wearing elastics in the wrong configuration, which results in improper settled occlusion. Therefore, to minimize the effort of engaging elastics, this patient friendly elastic applicator has been innovated which can be customized for all patients and can be given to them for engaging elastics easily inbetween appointments.

Procedure for fabrication:

A 19-gauge stainless steel wire (LeoWire, Leone SpA, Via P a Quaracchi, 50, 50019 Sesto Fiorentino, Firenze, Italy; www.leaone.it) and, at one end, a round configuration is given for engaging thumb and finger (Figure 1a).

Figure 1. (a) Design of elastic engager with a terminal end bent in the form of a hook. (b) Intra-oral elastic engaged by the hook of elastic engager. (c) Intra-oral view showing engagement of triangular elastic. (d) Intra-oral view showing engagement of Class III elastic. (e) Intra-oral view showing engagement of Class II elastic.

At its terminal end, a hook is fabricated that engages elastic (Figure 1b).

This specially fabricated flexible tool is easy to create and can be manufactured chairside, making the drawing in of elastics far less demanding for all patients (Figure 1c−e).