Various Disinfecting Methods of Orthodontic Pliers in Daily Clinical Practice: A comparative Study

Introduction: Orthodontic pliers are essential armamentarium in every orthodontic office and should be used once for one patient, then autoclaved before next use. Clinical orthodontics with higher volume of patients, requires a quick chair side disinfection method for pliers, also in rural centres with minimum infrastructure it is a challenge to maintain sterilisation protocols. Various disinfecting agents include alcohols , quaternary ammonium salts, formaldehyde, chloramine, sodium hypochlorite, spirit, glutaraldehyde etc. are available. Out of these we compared the commonly available disinfectants including ethyl alcohol, 5% glutaraldehyde, and 6% sodium hypochlorite to assess their disinfection efficacy after clinical use. Materials and method: 20 orthodontic pliers were inoculated with Coagulase negative streptococci. The pliers were divided in 4 groups with 5 pliers in each group. Each group was subjected to different disinfectant solution with one group aiding as control. The disinfectants used were: spirit (group 1), 5% glutaraldehyde (group 2), 2% sodium hypochlorite (group 3) and distilled water (control group). Results: spirit and 5% glutaraldehyde have shown to be potent disinfectants. Conclusions: Based on these results, we concluded that among the tested methods, disinfection of orthodontic pliers with spirit and 5% glutaraldehyde are the efficient methods for chair-side disinfection.