The Effect of Four Disc-shaped Polishing Systems on the Surface Roughness and Micro-hardness of Clearfil AP-X Esthetics Composite Resin

Background and aim: Polishing techniques are important in preserving the beauty and success of composite restorations. This study evaluated the surface roughness and micro-hardness of CLEARFIL AP-X Esthetics composite polished by different polishing systems.
Material and methods: A total of 50disc-shaped CLEARFIL AP-X Esthetics composite were prepared. Composite discs were divided into five groups. The first group was not polished, and other groups were polished by four types of polishing discs and were classified as follows: group 2: polished by Sof-lex disc, group 3: Optidisc, group 4: Dental finishing disc, group 5: Praxis polishing disc. All the specimens were stored in distilled water at 37 ° C for 24 hours, and after that, the surface roughness of composite samples was measured by a profilometer. After profilometry, the microhardness of samples was measured by the Vickers test. The data were analyzed using a one-way ANOVA test.
Results: The results indicated that the Sof-lex group had the lowest surface roughness with an average of 0.078±0.017, comparable with the control group(0.069±0.011). Statistical analysis demonstrated that surface roughness between different polishing systems was statistically significant (p<0.001). In addition, Praxis polishing disk with an average of 405.13±3.278 had the greatest micro-hardness than the control group (287.17±2.302 ), and an average of micro-hardness between different kinds of disc-shaped polishing systems was statistically significant (p<0.001).
Conclusions: Our results demonstrated that the Sof-Lex polishing system was more successful than other polishing systems in the finishing and polishing CLEARFIL AP-X Esthetics composite.