Do onlays and crowns offer similar outcomes to posterior teeth with mesial-occlusal-distal preparations? A systematic review.

OBJECTIVE: Teeth prepared for mesial-occlusal-distal (MOD) restorations have a significant risk of cusp fracture. Crowns and onlays can provide cusp coverage to reinforce posterior teeth at risk. Onlays are often more conservative of tooth structure which may be an advantage for teeth with large MOD preparations. It remains uncertain how onlays and crowns compare for posterior teeth with MOD tooth structure loss. The purpose of this systematic review was to compare the resistance to fracture, success rate, survival rate, and failure rate of teeth with MOD preparations restored with onlays or crowns.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: An electronic search queried Medline (PubMed), Embase (Ovid), Scopus, the Cochrane Library, and grey literature (OpenGrey) from database inception through April 29, 2023.

RESULTS: After eliminating duplicates and irrelevant records, 32 manuscripts were assessed. Only three publications met the criteria for inclusion. Most exclusions were due to poor reporting of restorative design and the amount of tooth structure remaining, or due to combining various restorative designs. Due to the limited sample size and high heterogeneity, no meta-analysis was conducted. One study observed a better outcome for onlays and two observed no difference. All three studies reported the mode of failure for crowns as more catastrophic whereas teeth with onlays could be salvaged.

CONCLUSIONS: Onlays may be an advantageous alternative to crowns for teeth with MOD preparations, but the level of evidence is insufficient to draw meaningful conclusions.

CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE: Current evidence is insufficient to determine whether onlays or crowns are providing a different outcome when used to restore posterior teeth with MOD tooth structure loss. However, the fracture of teeth with MOD tooth structure loss restored with onlays appears to be less catastrophic than when restored with crowns.