Bovine teeth can reliably substitute human dentine in an intra-tooth push-out bond strength model?

AIM: To investigate the reliability of using bovine teeth as an alternative to human teeth in an intra-tooth push-out model by comparing the bond strength of three root canal sealers in both tooth substrates.

METHODOLOGY: From human and bovine incisors (12 per group), one 1-mm disc was obtained from each root. On each disc, three standard 0.8mm-diameter holes were drilled through the dentine. After irrigation, the holes were filled with one of the three tested root canal sealers: AH Plus, MTA Fillapex or Total Fill BC Sealer. Tooth slices were kept in contact with sterile gauze moistened in PBS solution (pH=7.2) for 7 days at 37°C, and finally, a push-out load was applied until sealer dislocation. The bonded interface area was calculated to obtain data in MPa. The push-out data for each sealer and the overall push-out data for human and bovine teeth were compared (Mann-Whitney U). Kruskal-Wallis was used to study the sealers behavior at each of the dental substrates. Multiple comparisons were performed using Mann-Whitney U after Bonferroni correction (P<0.05).

RESULTS: Dentine substrate did not influence the push-out of either, individual sealers or overall sealers tested (Mann-Whitney U,P>0.05). In both human and bovine samples, AH Plus performed better than BC Sealer and MTA Fillapex, while BC Sealer also provided a superior push-out compared to MTA Fillapex (Mann-Whitney U, P<0.05).

CONCLUSION: When using an intra-tooth model, bovine teeth do not significantly influence the bond strength of sealers. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.