Description

Lasers were introduced into the field of dentistry as they are a precise and effective way to perform many dental procedures. Treatment with lasers provides a hope of overcoming the disadvantages of conventional dental procedures. As the applications for dental lasers expand,greater numbers of dentists will use the technology to provide patients with precision treatment that may minimize pain and recovery time. Every discipline of dentistry has been positively affected with the use of laser technology including oral medicine, oral surgery, pediatric and operative dentistry, periodontics and implantology, prosthetic dentistry. The ability of the lasers to perform less invasive procedures without any discomfort to the patients had made a tremendous impact on the delivery of dental care. This will continue as this technology will continue to improve and evolve.
In realism, lasers are not latest to dentistry.However it wasn’t in the early hours of
1980s that lasers really saw their use in clinical practice. Now a days, lasers have
practically found use in almost all aspects of dentistry. The key focus of clinical activity is
soft tissue applications for now. Apart from of the wavelength used, they offer a
diversity of advantages such as bloodless operational and post-operative field,
negligible amount of swelling and high patient support. Lasers offer the ability to
negotiate curves without any difficulty and folds in mouth. Pain is reduced or is absent
90% of the time, apparently due to sealing of nerve fibers. In some procedures like
maxillary midline frenectomy there is assurance of no postoperative pain.
In just single generation since then, lasers have been motivated out of the sphere of
fantasy into everyday life. “LASER” is a short form for ‘Light Amplification by
Stimulated Emission of Radiation’. A medical laser or apparatus includes a source
of electricity, mirrors to undeviate a beam, a crystal or gas that is motivated to release
the light and tubing to send the light energy.
The character of the substance through which the light passes determines the
specific properties of the laser and therefore what it can do in the human body.
The benefits of lasers in dentistry today include, soft tissue procedures, laser
fluorescence for caries detection and laser.Doppler Flow metry for pulp vitality testing.

While potential uses focus on hard tissues such as caries removal, cavity preparation,
remineralisation of incipient carious lesions and endodontic procedures, lasers have not
yet successfully replaced the whine of the hand piece. This is due to concerns over the
deleterious thermal effects of lasers on the underlying pulp. Blum recognized that
antibacterial effects of lasers depends on frequency which is only 30 Hz of ND: YAP
laser slow down growth of streptococcus mitis. According to in vitro study of
Kranendok AND: YAP laser is helpful in killing six tested periodontal pathogens.