Effect of Silver Diamine Fluoride in Arresting Dental Caries

Author(s): Myung Seo Seok

Low-cost and easily operated professionally applied fluoride therapy has been proposed as an alternative treatment option for children with dental caries. One of the professionally applied fluoride therapy is the application of silver diamine fluoride (SDF), which was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to be used as a desensitizing agent in 2014 and has been used off-label to arrest carious lesions. This literature review aims to analyze the benefits and limitations of SDF in arresting dental caries. The result shows the beneficial effect of SDF in arresting dental caries but has shown adverse effects of dark staining and reversible white spots on the oral mucosa. A fairly recent randomized clinical trial research paper on nanosilver fluoride (NSF) to overcome the adverse effects has been reviewed. The result shows that NSF demonstrates the effect of arresting dental caries without the adverse effects of SDF.

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