Minimally Invasive Dentistry: Core: Preserve healthy natural tooth structure. Plan: Early detection and risk assessment. Fix: Biomimetic repair

Minimal Intervention (MI) Dentistry shifts from the traditional "Extension for Prevention" to preserving healthy tooth structure. MI integrates prevention, remineralization, and minimal invasion. Its principles rely on managing the demineralization-remineralization cycle, exploiting adhesion, and using biomimetic materials like Glass Ionomer Cements and composites. Diagnosis involves caries risk assessment and is guided by Mount and Hume's classification of lesion site and size. When operative care is required, the focus is "Prevention of Extension". This is achieved through conservative preparation techniques such as Atraumatic Restorative Treatment (ART), chemo mechanical caries removal (e.g. Papacarie), the SMART technique, air-abrasion, lasers, and ozone therapy. Ultimately, MI emphasizes eliminating the disease and maximizing remineralization before resorting to minimal surgical repair.