LED vs halogen light-curing of adhesive-precoated brackets.
OBJECTIVE
To test the hypothesis that bonding with a blue light-emitting diode (LED) curing unit produces no more failures in adhesive-precoated (APC) orthodontic brackets than bonding carried out by a conventional halogen lamp.


METHODS
Sixty-five patients were selected for this randomized clinical trial, in which a total of 1152 stainless steel APC brackets were employed. In order to carry out a valid comparison of the bracket failure rate following use of each type of curing unit, each patient's mouth was divided into four quadrants. In 34 of the randomly selected patients, designated group A, the APC brackets of the right maxillary and left mandibular quadrants were bonded using a halogen light, while the remaining quadrants were treated with an LED curing unit. In the other 31 patients, designated group B, halogen light was used to cure the left maxillary and right mandibular quadrants, whereas the APC brackets in the remaining quadrants were bonded using an LED dental curing light. The bonding date, the type of light used for curing, and the date of any bracket failures over a mean period of 8.9 months were recorded for each bracket and, subsequently, the chi-square test, the Yates-corrected chi-square test, the Fisher exact test, Kaplan-Meier survival estimates, and the log-rank test were employed in statistical analyses of the results.


RESULTS
No statistically significant difference in bond failure rate was found between APC brackets bonded with the halogen light-curing unit and those cured with LED light. However, significantly fewer bonding failures were noted in the maxillary arch (1.67%) than in the mandibular arch (4.35%) after each light-curing technique.


CONCLUSIONS
The hypothesis cannot be rejected since use of an LED curing unit produces similar APC bracket failure rates to use of conventional halogen light, with the advantage of a far shorter curing time (10 seconds).
Mirabella
Davide
D
University of Ferrara, Ferrara, Italy; Private practice, Catania, Sicily.
Spena
Raffaele
R
Scognamiglio
Giovanni
G
Luca
Lombardo
L
Gracco
Antonio
A
Siciliani
Giuseppe
G
D000134:Acid Etching, Dental; D000293:Adolescent; D001641:Bicuspid; D003188:Composite Resins / Q000737:chemistry; D003481:Cuspid; D001840:Dental Bonding; D003743:Dental Enamel / Q000473:pathology; D004867:Equipment Design; D004868:Equipment Failure; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D007180:Incisor; D008029:Lighting / Q000295:instrumentation*; D008297:Male; D008334:Mandible; D008422:Materials Testing; D008437:Maxilla; D016382:Orthodontic Appliance Design; D016910:Orthodontic Brackets; D019279:Resin Cements / Q000737:chemistry / Q000528:radiation effects*; D013193:Stainless Steel / Q000737:chemistry; D016019:Survival Analysis
D003188:Composite Resins; D019279:Resin Cements; C477790:Transbond XT; D013193:Stainless Steel