Patent ID: 8186997

Claim:
A method for cleaning an oral cavity, said method comprising: a. positioning within a section of said oral cavity a device suitable for detecting and removing plaque from a surface of at least one tooth in said oral cavity, b. substantially simultaneously cleaning and irradiating said surface of at least one tooth in said oral cavity, said at least one tooth having applied thereto a fluorescent agent capable of binding to plaque on said surface of said at least one tooth, with incident radiation of a wavelength effective to provide a fluorescent emission when contacted with said fluorescent agent on said surface of said at least one tooth, c. collecting at least a portion of said fluorescent emission over a first time period, d. determining a first average plaque value (APV 1 ) based on said fluorescent emission collected over said first time period, e. collecting at least a portion of said fluorescent emission over a second time period, f. determining a second average plaque value (APV 2 ) based on said fluorescent emission collected over said second time period; and g. comparing said APV 1 to said APV 2 , wherein reflected light resulting from contact of said incident radiation with said surface is collected essentially simultaneously with said fluorescent emission and said APV 1 and APV 2 to determine average compensated plague value (ACPV) for said APV 1 and APV 2 .