A golf bag is filled with highly specialized tools, each designed to help golfers carve up certain sections of courses. If you’re hitting from a bunker, grab a sand wedge. If you’re on the green, it’s putter time. If you want to showcase your slice and embarrass yourself in front of your group, grab your driver.
But every golfer has a club they can use in a thousand different situations. For me, it’s a 7 iron. Almost like King Arthur pulled it from a stone, my 7 iron is a nearly mythical club—capable of saving me from consistently bad shots with its versatile, reliable performance.
Dentists have their own proverbial golf bags filled with specialized instruments to help with specific procedures. With the financial strain of COVD-19 related shutdowns weighing on clinicians, finding tools that are versatile for a variety of clinical situations is more crucial than ever.
Dentists need a 7 iron—a versatile tool capable of precise placement.
Ultradent’s new MTAFlow™ White repair cement is that versatile, dependable 7 iron as patients needing endo work flock to reopening offices.
This new repair cement comes as the latest addition to the MTAFlow™ family. Like its predecessor the original MTAFlow™ repair cement (already familiar to dentists), MTAFlow White repair cement kits consist of a powder and gel that clinicians mix themselves—giving dentists the power to achieve nearly any desired consistency for various procedures. This new formula is nonstaining—using Tantalum Oxide as the radiopacity agent for use anywhere in the tooth, especially in the esthetic zone.
MTAFlow White repair cement is mixed in the office, allowing clinicians to achieve desired consistencies for individual procedures.
This adaptability helps separate MTAFlow White repair cement from its competitors, according to Dr. Sonia Chopra, DDS. “I definitely don’t need so many different types of MTAs now,” she says of incorporating the MTAFlow repair cement family into her practice. “I think I have one of each right now, so that versatility is really helpful.”
“[MTAFlow repair cement] is so versatile and you can use it in so many applications, it just makes sense to use it,” Chopra says. “For me, the main selling point for general dentists specifically, is that they can use it in so many different ways without splurging,” she adds of MTAFlow White repair cement’s cost.
Adaptability is at the core of Dr. Chopra’s experience. She’s run the gauntlet of dental procedures: fillings, root canals, extractions, braces, implants, bridges, veneers, grafts, and I’m sure I’m leaving something out. Right now, she’s seeing a stressed need for endo work.
MTAFlow White repair cement kits come with proprietary powder and gel, as well as a technique guide, measuring spoon, mixing pad, (20) micro 20 ga tips, (10) skini syringes, (10) luer locks caps.
“We were seeing that people still really needed us,” she says of the early stages of the COVID-19 shutdown.
Dr. Chopra’s practice is nearly back to pre-quarantine operations—open five days/week, two doctors in the office at a time.
“We’ve managed to be strategic with our schedules so we can socially distance, so we’ve had to change stuff around but we’ve still made it work.”
While activity is nearing “normal,” Dr. Chopra’s office never fully closed… because tooth pain doesn’t care about quarantines. “We went down to three days a week, one doctor each day, just to make sure that we were getting people out of pain and keeping them out of the emergency room,” she says.
With office availability still limited in some areas, and patients postponing non-emergency procedures over the last few months, general dentists may be experiencing increasing requests to tackle endo work. Using flexible products applicable for a variety of scenarios will help limit initial costs and provide stability. They’re essential for reacclimating to procedures that might not have been common in an individual office prior to quarantine.
MTAFlow White repair cement being delivered with a NaviTip™ tip.
MTAFlow White repair cement comes in a kit. The two primary components are the powder and the gel (as dentists have seen with the original MTAFlow repair cement). The MTA powder is made through a proprietary process that refines it down to smaller than 10 microns. This fine powder—when mixed with the gel—provides very smooth cement that isn’t gritty or coarse.
The gel is also proprietary. When mixed with the MTA powder it creates a creamy, easy to deliver material. The gel is also equipped with an agent that helps accelerate setting time.
The mixing process is where the versatility of MTAFlow White repair cement shines.
“I can pretty much make whatever consistency I need to, so that definitely changes the application of it every time,” Chopra says. “Sometimes I’m fixing a furcal perforation and I don’t want the consistency to be runny because I want to pack. Because the perforation is so coronal, I can see it and pack it with ease, so I want a denser consistency. As opposed to resorption which could be anywhere in the root, and usually it’s down into the root, and in that case I want to keep my MTA a little more runny so I can deliver it all the way down there. A lot of times this is in the anterior region so I’m only going to use a white MTA in that area, so it’s nice to have that capability now.”
MTAFlow White can be mixed to to be delivered via a 29 ga NaviTip™ tip, seen here.
Being able to customize consistency gives MTAFlow White repair cement unparalleled ease of placement—you can achieve a consistency so flowable that it can be delivered via a 29 ga NaviTip™ tip.
“That’s probably my favorite thing about it, because it is so easy and you can get so deep in the canals. Whereas other vehicles to carry the material can be pretty bulky and the tips are really fat,” Chopra says. “If you’re not using a micro instrument, you’re not going to get as deep of a placement as you do with NaviTips.”
Basically, it all comes back to placement and versatility. Just like on the golf course and that trusted 7 iron.
With the new, nonstaining formula, MTAFlow White repair cement can be the reliable “club in the bag” for clinicians’ endo needs as we continue to acclimate to the COVID-19 world.