Journal of Dental Medicine

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Chlorhexidine is bonded well to the oral mucosa and dental pellicle and is poorly absorbed from the astrointestinal tract, but in high concentration it is absorbed enough to produce liver necrosis. In this case a dentistry student accidentally ingested a shot of 20% chlorhexidine gluconate solution. Treatments included washing the oral cavity with lots of tooth paste, drinking of 5% alginate syrup and ingestion of 5g small pieces of cork .The following adverse effects were experienced: headache, giddiness, mild mist, euphoria, stomachache, diarrhea and complete loss of taste sensation for 8h, which recurred gradually during the last 48 hours. According to the poor absorption, low toxicity and low concentration of conventional mouthwashes, systemic toxicity following drinking of some shots of this solution is rare. Ultimately if may cause gastritis. Other treatments which are helpful in the same cases are: drinking of hard water, kaolin and tragacant syrup, bicarbonates such as baking soda, carbonates such as beverage , citrates such as lemon-juice and chlorides such as brine and so on.

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Statement of Problem: Ultrasonic Scaling is one of the main sources of producing infected aerosols in dentistry. These aerosols are able to spread pathogens such as microorganisms associated with tuberculosis, conjunctivitis, influenza and other respiratory diseases, herpetic and other skin diseases, ADIS and hepatitis B.
Purpose: The aim of this study was to investigate the clinical effectiveness of an aerosol- reduction device attaching to ultrasonic scaler handpiece.
Materials and Methods: In this experimental study 18 patients participated. Randomly, mandibular and maxillary quadrants of one side, in each subject, were scaled using an ultrasonic scaler with aerosol-reduction device for 5 minutes. After 30 minutes, another quadrant was scaled by ultrasonic scaler without aerosol- reduction device. In order to determine the effectiveness of aerosol- reduction device, blood agar plates attached to the surgical mask of the operator, 30 cm far from the patient's mouth, were incubated in 37°c for three days and the colonies were counted. Median, Interquartile eange and Wilcoxon test, at the 0.05 level of significance, were used to analyze the data.
Results: The median and interquartile range for the number of colony forming units (CFUS) without aerosol- reduction device was 17.5 (8, 24), while the median for the number of CFUS when using aerosol-reduction device was 0 (0, 1), indicating significant statistical difference (PO.001)

Conclusion: The aerosol- reduction device significantly reduces the amount of aerosols produced during ultrasonic scaling.