Mechanical behavior of three maxillofacial prosthetic adhesive systems: a pilot project.

The use of maxillofacial prosthetic adhesives remains controversial. A new machine for mechanical testing of adhesives was developed. This machine was used for in vivo testing of three adhesive systems to determine the adhesive joint strength of bonding silicone facial prosthetic elastomer to facial skin. Tensile, torsion, and combined tensile-torsion tests were carried out on two human subjects. The three adhesives tested were PSA1, Pros-Aide, and Dow Corning 355. All adhesives were applied according to the manufacturers' instructions. A 900 gm bonding load was applied for 20 seconds. The experimental design made use of two subjects, and the entire experiment was repeated on each subject. One test site on the cheek was used. Adhesive types were compared by means of the Student-Newman-Keuls method. Within the limitations of the design of this pilot study, the results showed that Dow Corning 355 adhesive was statistically significantly stronger than the other two adhesives evaluated by means of tensile and combined tensile-torsional tests. Although the results of the present pilot project are of interest, extrapolation to definitive conclusions of a clinical nature should be avoided.