The treatment of Class II malocclusion frequently requires maxillary molars’ distalization. The extraoral appliance was the first created with this aim. It has proved its efficiency along the course of more than a century of its use. It presents, however, as a great disadvantage, the negative esthetic aspect, since its results depend on systematic patient cooperation. Thus, many intraoral distalizing appliances were developed with the specific aim of eliminating the need of patient cooperation.The one of them is the Distal Jet. According to Carano and Testa (1996) it is the only intraoral mechanism capable of distalizing molar of bodily. A pilot study was developed to evaluate the effect of this appliance. It used six adolescents (average age: 13.08), who had dental Class II malocclusion and a standard face pattern in common. Lateral headfilms were used before and after the treatment. The average time length was 4.5 months. Soft tissues, skeletal and dental changes were determined, comparing the measurements of the initial and final cephalograms. The items that varied significantly according to the Wilcoxon test were crown distal tipping of the second molar, distal movement of the first molar and distal movement of the second molar. The Distal Jet proved itself to be efficient in the upper molars’ distalization mainly by the small component of distal tipping of the first molars. The anchorage loss and the increase in the lower anterior face height did not present statistical significance.
Class II malocclusion; Intraoral distalizing appliances; Distal Jet
