Inside Look: Temporaries that feel permanent

DUX Dental’s new translucent color blending temporary cement, ZONEfree, offers strength and esthetics. Here’s an inside look at the product and what dental professionals are saying about it.

You don’t want all your hard work to go to waste.

After you’ve spent all that time creating a beautiful provisional for your patient, you don’t want the cement you use to take away from the esthetics. This is a common problem with temporary cements, and one that the team at DUX Dental wanted to address with the company’s latest launch, ZONEfree. Dr. Scott Finlay, who’s among the more than 100 dentists, CDAs and EFDAs who evaluated the product before it was launched earlier this month, says the team has accomplished that.

“In advanced levels of comprehensive care utilizing indirect restorations, the provisional phase is undoubtedly the key to predictability,” Dr. Finlay said. “These prototypes provide diagnostic information and communication for both esthetics and functional requirements. With preparation designs, that are increasingly conservative, the limitation with provisional cements in the past was their opacity. This resulted in show through in the body of the restoration or at the cavosurfaces. The use of ZONEfree eliminates this esthetic compromise.”

The team at DUX has been working on this temporary cement for years, with everything really coming into place about 18 months ago, said Stacey Williams, marketing director for ZONEfree. That’s when they found the right partner for the all-important color blending nano fillers that allowed them to take the classic Zone cement, with its easy removal and clean up, to a new level of esthetics.

“Everyone can see the dental industry is moving toward esthetics,” Williams said. “People want things to look good, even a temporary. Patients want to walk out of the office smiling and to be able to look in the mirror and say ‘that looks fantastic.’ We knew we needed to address where the market was going and what patients want and need for esthetics, but we also knew it needed to be as easy to use as our other classic cements.”

ZONEfree has been on the market for just a few weeks now, but DPR recently had the opportunity to talk with dental professionals who evaluated ZONEfree about its benefits, from the improved esthetics to its easy clean up. Here’s what they had to say.

The esthetics

Just like Dr. Finlay, Shannon Pace Brinker, CDA, CDD, and Clinical Director for Contemporary Product Solutions, is impressed by the cement’s esthetics. All too often she’s fabricated a beautiful temporary restoration only to have it ruined by the cement she has to put underneath. This cement is translucent instead of white or tooth-colored, so she doesn’t have to worry about a really white tooth shining through and compromising esthetics. Patients don’t like what Pace Brinker described as a “moon tooth,” and ZONEfree eliminates that.

The color blending nano fillers allow the cement to adjust to any adjacent surface, and even with thin provisionals, there won’t be bleed through or discoloration.

“The esthetics are far superior,” Dr. Finlay said. “Microleakage is minimized, thereby reducing post-operative sensitivity and staining.”

It’s easy to use

ZONEfree is a zinc oxide non-eugenol temporary cement, Williams said, and that means it’s easy to use and to clean up.
You can peel it away in one piece, Pace Brinker said, and be confident that it’s all gone. With some cements you can’t be sure you’ve removed it all, and if you don’t it could end up under your patient’s gums, causing tissue irritation.

“It’s going to be easier on your patients’ mouths because you’re not scraping away or having to search out where the left over cement is,” Williams said. “The fact that it’s not crystal clear is a benefit. Because it’s translucent you’re still getting the esthetic benefit, and you can see where the cement is and where you need to remove it. There’s no poking and prodding going on.”

Even though it’s easy to remove and to clean up, the cement is still strong and can be used in both the posterior and the anterior, Pace Brinker said. It’s strong enough to keep the restoration in place, but it won’t pull out the build ups when you remove the restoration in two or three weeks.

“Some dentists will be worried it may have resin or may have something in it that can pull out those build ups, and assume it’s similar to a bonding resin,” she said. “To this day the majority of restorations we’ve done with this cement are posterior and we’ve not pulled out a build up yet. No teeth have broken underneath and no build ups have come out, and that’s pretty good after 40 restorations.”

Not only is it easy to clean up, it’s also easy to dispense, Dr. Allan Mohr said, and with this cement his patients don’t experience post-op sensitivity.

Better bonds

Because the cement is non-eugenol, you don’t have to worry about problems bonding the final restoration later. It won’t crack acrylic. With a resin-based cement, if there’s cement left over that sticks to the build up, it creates a problem when it’s time to bond the final restoration. ZONEfree actually enhances your ability to get the best bond at delivery, Dr. Finlay said.

Why you should try it

There are many reasons Pace Brinker and Drs. Finlay and Mohr will continue to use this new cement, from its esthetics to its durability to its easy clean up. These are all the reasons they think you might want to give it a try as well.

“My experience has been phenomenal,” Dr. Mohr said. “It’s my go to cement. We can’t get enough of it.”