Dental News - ADA offers advice on how to handle dental scrap

Dental Tribune International

Fri. 27. September 2019

save

SYDNEY, Australia: The Australian Dental Association (ADA) has recently published an article in which it discusses the best practices for recycling dental scrap. Although many dentists treat it as waste, dental scrap can be recycled by an experienced refiner. This is an environmentally friendly solution that will generate additional income for the dental practice.

Dental offices often discard dental scrap without considering the value of recycling it, the potential revenue this could produce or its impact on the environment. It is true that materials such as silver and mercury can negatively affect the environment and should, therefore, be responsibly recycled. Moreover, since dental scrap such as bridges, inlays and different types of crowns, including porcelain-fused-to-metal crowns, typically contain a mixture of gold, platinum, palladium or silver, recycling can be profitable. With the help of an experienced refiner, the precious metals in the dental scrap can be easily isolated and later sold instead of ending up in landfills.

According to the article, amalgam waste and dental scrap are two completely different materials that should not be treated in the same way by dentists. Instead, valuable dental material should be separated from amalgam.

Every dental alloy is unique and requires an assay to determine its composition. Similarly, the combination of materials of which dental implants and other restorations are composed differs. The article shared that one bridge could contain 17% gold, while another one could contain up to 50% gold, which is why recycling all dental scrap through a metal refinery is the only way to ensure fair compensation.

Besides gold, recycled palladium could bring profit to the dental office. The article cautions that dentists who only collect scrap material with a golden-yellow colour could be wasting up to 50% of the value in their dental scrap.

Tags:

To post a reply please login or register

Interview: How to handle complex endodontic cases

Registration for ROOTS SUMMIT 2024 is open, and the organisers would like to introduce some of the great speakers and their lecture topics for next year’s...

AI chatbots show strong accuracy in tooth whitening advice but fall short on readability, study finds

AMMAN, Jordan: A new comparative study has found that leading artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots provide largely accurate and reliable information on ...

AI judges not reliable for evaluating dental advice

XI’AN, China: As patients increasingly turn to artificial intelligence (AI) tools for oral health advice, questions arise not only about the reliability ...

ADA updates guidance on appropriate use of dental imaging

CHICAGO, US: The American Dental Association (ADA) has issued updated recommendations on dental imaging, reinforcing that radiographs and CBCT scans should ...

NHS dental appointment no-shows add pressure to struggling services

LONDON, England: Recent reports have highlighted the growing number of National Health Service (NHS) dental appointments being missed without cancellation. ...

Pandemic leads UK dentists to seek advice in record numbers

GLASGOW, UK: Changing restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic have regularly affected the scope of work that dental professionals have been allowed to ...

“Digital tools will continue to change how dental technicians work”

Felix Paul Wright is a master dental technician in Germany specialising in digital workflows and implant prosthetics. At Dentsply Sirona World Germany, held...

Allisone Technologies now offers dental implant recognition with acquisition of Spotimplant

PARIS, France: Allisone Technologies, a dental artificial intelligence (AI) company, has announced the acquisition of Spotimplant, AI-based software for ...

How to overcome obstacles in offering interdisciplinary dental care

Delivery of dental care falls into two categories: single provider care (uni-disciplinary) and collaborative care. The structure of a practice—that is, ...

FDI offers COVID-19 guidance to dental professionals

GENEVA, Switzerland: The SARS-CoV-2 outbreak is causing significant disruption to dental practice worldwide. Oral health professionals, dental associations ...

Education

Live webinar
Fri. 31 July 2026
12:00 pm EST (New York)