Comparison of Two Retention Appliances with Respect to Clinical Effectiveness

Özet

Objective: The aim of this study was to compare the clinical effectiveness of Essix and Hawley retainers during the retention period.Methods: A total of 30 subjects whose fixed orthodontic treatment results were evaluated according to the American Board of Orthodontics Phase III Objective Grading system were included in this study. After the removal of orthodontic attachments, the study participants were equally divided into two retention protocols: upper-lower Essix and upper-lower Hawley. The subjects were instructedto wear their retainers full time for 6 months, except during meals, and during nights only for 6 months. The clinical effectiveness ofthe retainers was evaluated according to the overjet, overbite, maxillary, and mandibular intercanine widths, intermolar widths, archlengths, irregularity indexes, and lateral cephalometric measurements. All dental model and lateral cephalometric measurementswere performed by the same investigator during three periods: pre-treatment, post-treatment, and post-retention.Results: The overjet, overbite, maxillary, and mandibular intercanine widths; intermolar widths; and arch lengths and lateral cephalometric measurements were not statistically significantly different between the groups and identified time periods. Although themaxillary and mandibular irregularity indexes increased from the post-treatment to post-retention periods, the difference was notstatistically significant. Pre-treatment, post-treatment, and post-retention lateral cephalometric measurements were not statisticallysignificantly different between and within the groups.Conclusion: According to the results of a repeated-measures analysis of variance with two factors, and although an increase wasfound in the maxillary and mandibular irregularity indexes, the clinical effectiveness of Essix and Hawley retainers was found to besimilar during the retention period.