Staining of esthetic brackets by plaque disclosing solutions

Aim: To evaluate the staining of esthetic orthodontic brackets by plaque disclosing solutions. Methods: Two types of brackets manufactured by GAC/DENTSPLY^® were evaluated: ceramic (n=30) and polycarbonate (n=30). The brackets were divided into 6 groups. Two control groups (n=6) were immersed in absolute ethanol: GI - ceramic brackets and GII - polycarbonate brackets. Four experimental groups (n=12) were immersed in different plaque disclosing solutions: GIII (ceramic brackets) and GIV (polycarbonate brackets) were immersed in Replak^®; GV (ceramic brackets) and GVI (polycarbonate brackets) were immersed in Replasul “S”^®. Relative quantitative analysis of the influence of plaque disclosing tablets on bracket staining was performed using reflectance spectrophotometry of stain deposition. Exploratory analysis of the data was performed using Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) in a 2x2 factorial setup (bracket x immersion) with additional treatments (controls). Results: The results demonstrated that the ceramic brackets presented the highest amount of staining when Replasul “S”^® was used (pd”0.05). However, when Replak^® was used, no statistically significant difference was found in comparison with the control group (p>0.05). For polycarbonate brackets, staining was detected for both disclosing solutions (p>0.05). Conclusions: The disclosing solutions caused stain formation on polycarbonate brackets and, under the tested conditions, use of Replak^® on ceramic brackets did not cause staining.