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Why Contacts Are So Important To Success In Dentistry

Why Contacts Are So Important To Success In Dentistry
by Lisa Knowles, DDS

There are two kinds of contacts in dentistry that are absolutely crucial to your success: the technical kinds involved with teeth and the relational kinds involved with patients.

There are two kinds of important contacts in dentistry: the contacts we make with patients and team members to strengthen our relationships, and the technical kinds of contacts­ that close teeth tightly against one another. Both types of contacts—relational and technical—are extremely essential to our success in dentistry.

First, let me explain the technical importance of contacts in teeth. Patients hate food impaction. “Food gets caught right here,” my new patient said annoyingly the other day as he pointed in between his lower left molars. “I just had this filling placed a few months ago with a dentist my wife goes to, and now I have to floss it every time I eat, or I will have half my meal in there.”

Patients get angry over poor contacts and food traps. They don’t want to be bothered with the hassle of food impaction, and they may not even know that poor contacts are a source for further decay or even periodontal effects. So, it’s important that we get contacts right the first time. After all, it’s not that hard to check for open contacts at the end of treatment. This point of aggravation comes up in my office more times than I would like to think, which is why I want to review the importance of getting good contacts when we restore teeth, particularly when we complete fillings for patients.

Getting tight contacts can be challenging if we don't use the proper techniques. My failures come from having the wrong equipment or from not ensuring proper placement of a matrix band. As someone who has worked in multiple workplaces—from clinic-based settings to private practices—I am often forced to work with whatever is available and use the techniques other dentists think are the best ways to do something.

Further, there usually is not much I can do to adapt in these situations, but contacts are different. I have only found a couple of ways to make a really good contact, especially when restoring cavities with composite restorations. I will skip amalgam fillings, because condensing amalgam tightly is not typically a problem; it’s usually the composite fillings that create problems for us.

Read full article on Dentistry iQ.