Whitening Trays—Finding the Right Balance

Finding a balance between rigidity and flexibility may be a good axiom for all dentists. Too rigid and you risk missing out on innovative opportunities; too flexible and you make changes without thinking them through, creating chaos for your team and patients.

The rigid/flexible balance is crucial when talking about whitening trays, too. When trays are too rigid, they let saliva and sulcular fluid seep in, chemically destroying the whitening gel rapidly. Even worse, when they’re too flexible, they won’t seal at all.

Dr. Rod Kurthy and the team at KöR Whitening have created a whitening tray—the KöR-Seal Tray—that’s just the right balance of rigid and flexible. Rigid enough for stability on the teeth, yet flexible enough to create a seal that prevents leakage. Dr. Kurthy uses the refrigerator door analogy: “Look at your refrigerator door, and you’ll see a sealing gasket around the perimeter. Is that gasket hard or soft? It’s soft because that’s what will create an excellent seal.”

The EVA material used to make KöR Seal Trays is stiff enough to be stable on the teeth and flexible enough to create a tight and effective seal at the cervical margins. This isn’t true of conventional whitening trays, which is why the whitening gel is active for only 20 to 35 minutes. The saliva and sulcular fluid that seeps under those trays contaminates the gel with the antioxidant enzyme glutathione peroxidase, destroying the peroxide in the gel. KöR Seal Trays don’t let that happen, so that means KöR whitening gels stay active for 6 or more hours.

And isn’t that what you want when whitening patients’ teeth—a gel that’s doing its job as long as possible? Pairing the right whitening gel with a uniquely and precisely designed tray that’s the perfect combination of stiff and flexible will help ensure treatment success and patient satisfaction.