Journal of oral rehabilitation
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Clinical procedures, such as acid etching and reshaping of the teeth supporting removable partial dentures by grinding off some enamel surface, increase the permeability of dental enamel. Teeth take several months in vivo to partially recover from such damage. In the meantime, the tooth is more susceptible to carious decay. ⋯ The adhesive resin film covering the etched or ground enamel surfaces was found to decrease significantly the diffusion through dental enamel. This finding confirms the clinical value of dental adhesives used to protect ground or accidentally acid-etched enamel surfaces. SEM analysis showed that adhesive resin covers the porous surface of the acid-etched and ground enamel tightly.