by Dr John Pohl, Hawsburn Village Dental, Melbourne, VIC
When I purchased my practice five years ago, I decided to reward myself by making endodontics easier. I had reached a point where I dreaded doing root canal therapy with hand files as it gave me headaches, wrist aches and took a long time to complete. A friend of mine who is an endodontist was the speaker at a course and he was using the Protaper system. As he’s a very trustworthy source and I had watched him use this system in his own practice, I purchased my own Protaper system.
What’s good about it
The whole job is made more efficient because the rotary system does all the work for you. It comes with a specialised handpiece and an array of files in various sizes. Although it doesn’t include an apex locator, it is very efficient at recognising when it is approaching the apex or when it has reached a narrow area. The file detects the situation and automatically reverses itself while making a beeping noise to alert you. There is very little risk of fracturing the instrument as it will auto-reverse whenever the space is too tight.
It makes the job much quicker, easier and I no longer suffer from aching wrists and headaches.
What’s not so good
There are a few wires that can get in the way. You need to plug it into the wall socket, plug in your pedal and plug in the handpiece. This can make it difficult to place on my bracket table because the table is too small. I generally place it on the bench behind me which means a bit of twisting and turning during the procedure.
Where did you get it
Dentsply.
