About Dental Root Tip Pick Patterns
Root tip picks are fine-ended hand instruments that dental professionals use to retrieve loose root tips and small fragments after an extraction. We supply them in several patterns: straight picks, left and right angled picks, West and Howard patterns, and apical root tip picks.
Straight and angled working ends
On a straight pick the working end follows the main line of the instrument. Left and right picks have working ends angled in opposite directions, which is why they are usually described as a left/right pair.
Working-end direction is only one attribute. Handle form, overall length and the number of working ends are separate choices, and each one changes which instrument you are ordering.
Named patterns and figures
Pattern names identify a design family rather than a single instrument:
- Heidbrink patterns include straight and angled forms.
- West is a pattern family made in several figures, so the figure number matters as well as the name.
- Howard ranges include single-ended forms and a double-ended form that carries two working ends.
For that reason, the full pattern name and figure or reference identify a replacement far more precisely than "root tip pick" alone.
Single-ended, double-ended and pairs
These terms describe different things:
- Single-ended: one working end on the instrument.
- Double-ended: two working ends on one instrument.
- Pair or set: the number of instruments supplied.
A double-ended pick is still one instrument, and a left/right pair is two instruments.
Pick or elevator?
Makers do not use the names consistently: the same kind of fine instrument may be sold as a root tip pick or a root tip elevator. Compare the pattern, reference and working-end form rather than relying on the noun. For broader elevator patterns, see our root elevators; for an instrument that grips fragments with jaws instead, see our spring-action root fragment forceps.
Requesting a quote
Our root tip pick options are listed as Straight Pick, Left/Right Pair, West Pattern, Howard Pattern, Apical Root Tip Pick and Apical Pick. Request a quote with the pattern or full reference you need, the configuration (for example straight, left or right) and the quantity.
