Chapter 7: Technological Aids and Coronal Caries.

Abstract

In recent decades, dentistry has developed significantly in all areas. While in the past, caries was mainly treated operatively, the today's management has shifted toward noninvasive, minimal invasive, and, only if needed, invasive treatment options. Aiming at enabling the most noninvasive or conservative treatment option requires early caries detection, which, however, remains challenging. The progression of early or noncavitated caries lesions can nowadays be successfully controlled, as well as lesions arrested by oral hygiene procedures combined with the use of fluorides, sealants, or resin infiltration. Methods such as near-infrared light transillumination, fibre-optic transillumination, digital fibre-optic transillumination, laser fluorescence, or quantitative light fluorescence measurements were introduced in the dental market to provide X-ray-free caries detection, assessment, and monitoring. For approximal surfaces that are not directly visible, bitewing radiography is still the standard in detecting caries lesions. The use of artificial intelligence has become the most recent technological aid for the detection of caries lesions on bitewing radiographs and clinical images and has to be understood as an emerging technology, which requires extensive research in the future. The aim of this chapter is to give an overview of different possibilities to detect coronal caries lesions and suggestions of how to improve this process.