[Treatment of teeth with open canal system using mineral trioxide aggregate as apical barrier under the dental...

To evaluate the effect of closing root apex of permanent teeth with mineral trioxide aggregate to form barricade in root tip under the dental operating microscope.

63 teeth treated in our department with open root apex and periapical periodontitis were selected, MTA was used to rigorously close the root apex under microscope, and thermoplastic gutta pertscha was used to fill dental root after formation of barricade in the root tip. All patients revisited regularly for clinical examinations after treatment.

Among the 63 treated teeth, only one tooth (23) was insufficiently filled because of the long dental root and unclear field of vision under microscope, the remaining 62 teeth were filled adequately. The postoperative dental film showed 43 teeth were properly filled while 17 had a little over-filling. The patients were rechecked after three months, and the results showed that 2 patients underwent retro-filling because of fistula, 2 patients were lost during follow-up period, and the remaining patients reached the requirement for success including no sensitivity to percussion, improvement or disappearance of pathological changes around the root tip on dental film and regeneration of bone trabecula. The therapeutic effect was not influenced by minor over-filling. The overall success rate was 95%.

The method of using mineral trioxide aggregate (MTA) to treat teeth with root apex open is accurate and convenient and the effect is pretty good.