Investigation of bracket bonding for orthodontic treatments using en-face optical coherence tomography

Despite good diagnosis and treatment planning, orthodontic treatment can fail if bonding fails. It is now common practice to address the aesthetic appearance of patients using aesthetic brackets instead of metal ones. Therefore, bonding aesthetic brackets has become an issue for orthodontists today. Orthodontic bonding is mainly achieved using composite resin but can also be performed with glass ionomer or resin cements. For improving the quality of bonding, the enamel is acid etched for 30 seconds with 38% phosphoric acid and then a bonding agent is applied. In our study we investigated and compared the quality of bonding between ceramic brackets, polymeric brackets and enamel, respectively using a new investigation method - OCT. The aim of our study was to evaluate the resin layer at the bracket base - tooth interface.