Airblasting Teeth

Burly Thomas B. Tucker of Corpus Christi, Tex. is no braver than anybody else about going to the dentist. Recently, after many postponements, Patient Tucker lowered himself into the chair of Dentist Robert Beauregard Black and said: "I am so nervous you can't touch my teeth without novocaine."

Dr. Black took a look. Then, murmuring soothingly, he flicked a metal instrument that looked something like a small pneumatic drill past Mr. Tucker's suspicious eyes and went to work. But Mr. Tucker just relaxed. He felt no jarring, no pressure, no buzzing. Few, if any, of Dr. Black's fingers were in his mouth at any one time. All Patient Tucker felt was an occasional tiny, cool jet of air. When the session was over, he rushed out of the dentist's office to tell people that the days of the buzzing, overheating dentist's drill are over.

In this week's Journal of the American Dental Association, Dr. Black is somewhat less inclusive in his claims for his new instrument--several special types of cavities still require ordinary burrs. But he feels that there is definite cause for good cheer among dental patients.

Dr. Black's new method, which he calls "airbrasive," is something like sandblasting, i.e., he wears hard surfaces away with an abrasive propelled by fast-moving air. Into a tooth cavity, a 1/50th-inch nozzle jets a sharply focused blast of fine aluminum oxide particles at 90 pounds pressure per square inch. The jet travels at the rate of 2,000 feet per second. The particles grind the tooth while the air pressure keeps it cool. Another nozzle, on the vacuum-cleaner principle, sucks in the abrasive particles as soon as they have done their work.

Wear & tear use up the stainless steel abrasive nozzles at a rate of four average cavities per nozzle (cost: 1-c-). Wear & tear on the dentist is also minimal: all he has to do is press a small trigger and aim the jet.

Dr. Black has devoted six years to developing his technique. But he wants to tinker with the instrument at least another year before submitting it for general use.

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