?When and Why We Use Rubber Dam Isolation <br />Excellent moisture control<br />It acts as a physical barrier between the selected operator field and the oral cavity, which prevents saliva, blood, gingival crevicular fluid, humid exhaled air, and other debris from interfering with the restorative treatment.<br />Soft tissue retraction<br />When correctly inverted, it successfully retracts the gingivae, thereby allowing improved access to deep interproximal carious lesions for direct restoration as well as to prepare and subsequently indirectly restore teeth with equi-/sub-gingival margins.<br />Patient safety<br />The safety aspects associated with its use during root canal treatment and also when removing existing amalgam restorations are well established. It eliminates the risk for potentially harmful dental materials, chemicals (notably, sodium hypochlorite), and small instruments from being ingested into the gastro-intestinal tract, or worse, inhaled into the lungs.<br />Prevention of infection transfer<br />During long operative procedures, it is not uncommon for patients to feel a need to cough, which is considered a ballistic event that releases significant aerosol droplets that may potentially contain infectious respiratory micro-organisms (e.g. SARS-CoV-2).<br />The patient's saliva may also harbour infectious disease particles that may pose risk to both the dentist and dental nurse during an aerosol generating procedure (AGP), against which the dental dam acts as a preventative barrier essentially reducing the infection transfer risk posed by AGPs.4<br />It provides an aseptic field during endodontic treatment thereby preventing intra-canal contamination by oral microbes that may lead to treatment failure through persistent infection.<br />Stress-free dentistry<br />For the dentist: Isolating the field of view improves both access and visibility. This helps the clinician to focus better during the operative procedure without distraction from the local soft tissues, a fogged-up mirror, a talkative patient, and also by blocking view of the rest of the dentition during treatment.<br />