What is Dental Amalgam?
Most people recognise dental amalgam as silver fillings. Dental amalgam is a mixture of mercury, silver, tin and copper. Mercury, which makes up about 50 percent of the compound, is used to bind the metals together and to provide a strong, hard, durable filling material. After years of research, mercury has been found to be the only element that will bind these metals together in such a way that can be easily manipulated into a tooth cavity. In the bound form, mercury presents no health risk and the current move away from this material in the result of environmental and aesthetic concerns.
Well designed and maintained restorations have demonstrated a capacity to survive for decades when compared to more recent dental materials.
