Atraumatic Restorative Treatment: More than a Minimally Invasive Approach?

Abstract

Minimally invasive (MI) caries management has largely evolved over the years to include approaches that not only aimed to preserve as much tooth structure as possible but also to embrace prevention and risk management strategies. The atraumatic restorative treatment (ART) is a minimally invasive approach that was initially established to address the issue of increasing number of salvable teeth that kept being extracted in remote parts of the world where there was a limited access to the necessary equipment to enable preserving teeth in the primary and permanent dentitions. Managing carious lesions following ART is not as demanding as that in the conventional restorative methods, however, there are certain factors known to contribute to the failure of atraumatic restorative treatment that need to be considered to ensure success. However, and despite the advantages associated with using ART there seems to be a lack of awareness among dental practitioners regarding adopting this approach that can largely affect effective practice. Therefore, there is a need to spread the awareness and further educate practitioners particularly in this Covid-19 era where the virus and its variants have impacted the provision of routine dental treatment and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.