investigation in to the concepts and techniques used for establishing postpalatal seal in undergraduate dental curriculum

ABSTRACT

A survey of Pakistani Dental Colleges was conducted to determine which concepts and techniques are currently prevalent in the teaching of establishing the postpalatal seal in the undergraduate dental curriculum. A previous structured questionnaire from international article comprised seven multiple-choice questions, was distributed by mail and personal contact to 50 demonstrators and faculty members of Prosthodontics departments, of ten different [3 Government and 7 Private] Dental Colleges in the country. Of these, 42 teachers retuned the completed questionnaire, yielding a response rate of 84%. Results from this survey showed that 85.72% of the teachers were teaching a combination of phonation with other methods for determining the location of the vibrating line. The one vibrating line concept for establishing the postpalatal seal [PPS] was taught by 80.95.7% of teachers, 52.38% of these locate the posterior termination of the maxillary denture posterior to vibrating line. Carving the PPS in the maxillary master cast was taught by 83.33% of teachers. Most of the teachers 83.33% were teaching the students to carve the PPS to a depth of 1.0-1.5 mm in the maxillary master cast. Compressibility of the palatal tissues was a consideration during PPS carving for all of the teachers. The butterfly pattern was the most frequently [88.09%] described pattern for PPS carving. No difference in Concepts and Techniques in the teaching of establishing postpalatal seal was evident from government and private dental colleges