CRYOTHERAPY

Cryotherapy has been in use for more than 50 years in oral medicine and in pathology. Initially, this use was limited to treating lip cancer and cancer of the oral cavities. It’s uses in the area of head and neck are currently extensive and include treatment of various benign growths in the skin, as well as malignant lesions and has been frequently applied in medicine and other fields of dentistry. Also used after intraoral excisional surgical procedures, periodontal surgery, and after extractions and implant placement and was found to be effective in reducing swelling, pain, and arthritis associated with temporomandibular joint disorders. In the field of endodontics, cryotherapy has been reported to be used after peri radicular surgeries and during root canal treatment to minimize postoperative pain and inflammation. Other implementation of cryotherapy in endodontics is deep cryotherapy of nickel-titanium (NiTi) endodontic files, which offered enhanced cyclic fatigue resistance, reducing potential file separation. More recently, cryotherapy was successfully tried as a useful adjunct for hemostasis in vital pulp cryotherapy in conjunction with bioceramic materials.