Comparative evaluation of tooth surface roughness caused by three different powered toothbrushes and a novel manual toothbrush -An SEM and AFM study.

Abstract

Toothbrush is the most frequently used tool for mechanical plaque control. Variety of manual and powered toothbrushes are available in the market, and it is often a dilemma for a common man that which one to choose among the wide range. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to evaluate and compare the tooth surface roughness caused by three different powered toothbrushes. In total, 160 samples comprising of 80 enamel and cementum each were equally and randomly divided into four groups: Group 1 multi-directional powered toothbrushing; Group 2 oscillating/rotating/pulsating powered tooth brushing; Group 3 sonic powered tooth brushing; and Group 4 manual tooth brushing. They were further sub-divided equally into Control and Test. The Test samples were brushed for 2 min every day for a period of 1 month. The prepared samples were evaluated for surface roughness using scanning electron microscope at 1000 × magnification and atomic force microscope at the nanoscale. A statistically significant difference was seen in the enamel and cementum roughness between multi-directional tooth brush group and sonic (P = 0.00); multi-directional tooth brush group and manual tooth brush group (P = 0.00); oscillating tooth brush group and sonic group (P = 0.00); oscillating tooth brush group and manual tooth brush group (P = 0.00); and sonic group and manual tooth brush group (P = 0.00). The surface microroughness caused by tooth brushing was found to be least using multi-directional and oscillating/rotational/pulsating powered toothbrush, followed by sonic powered toothbrush and maximum in manual toothbrush.