Effects of bleaching on mercury ion release from dental amalgam

The chemical reactions that take place at the amalgam surface when exposed to bleaching agents are not well-understood. It is known, however, that mercury ions are released from dental amalgam when bleached. We hypothesized that increasing concentrations of hydrogen peroxide are more effective than water at increasing mercury ion release from dental amalgam. We prepared dental amalgam discs (n = 65) by packing amalgam into cylindrical plastic molds and divided them into 13 equal groups of 5 discs each. The discs in each group were individually immersed in either 0%, 3.6%, 6%, or 30% (w/v) hydrogen peroxide at exposure periods of 1, 8, 48, and 168 hrs. Samples were taken for mercury ion release determination by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. There were significant increases in mercury release between control and all other hydrogen peroxide concentrations at all exposure times (p < 0.05).