Reason to celebrate?

Follow-up to Welcome to the MsC in Endodontics – Warwick Dentsitry / Warwick Medical School from Liviu's blog

An impressive retrospective epidemiologic research has been published in the JOE May 2010:

Epidemiologic evaluation of the outcomes of orthograde endodontic retreatment.

Salehrabi R, Rotstein I.

J Endod. 2010 May;36(5):790-2. Epub 2010 Mar 24

Why impressive?

1.    5 years retrospektive.

2.    Data collected from across the US.

3.    Loss of less than 5% in patient pool.

4.    All endodontic retreatment performed by specialist endodontists.

5.    4744 nonsurgical retreatment reviewed.

Quoted results:

“Overall, 89% of all teeth were retained in the oral cavity after

nonsurgical endodontic retreatment. Four percent of all teeth underwent

apical surgery, and 11% were extracted at the end of the 5-year

observation period.“

Shortcomings of the research:

1.    Discussed is “survival rate” and not the ReRCT “success rate”.

2.    There is no knowledge about CAP healing. (Are treating to gain “survival rate” or for “healing”?)

3.    There is no knowledge about systemic health implications due to non resolved CAP.

Conclusions

Are there reasons to celebrate?

Definitive yes if one intends to compare “survival rates” (…Implantology is knocking at the door!).

Liviu

Liviu Steier : 27 Apr 2010 19:01 |  Tags: 21St Century Endodontics In The |  Comments (0) |  Trackbacks (1) |  Report a problem