Representative survey on the reprocessing of endodontic instruments in Germany

Area of Science:

• Dental hygiene
• Infection control
• Endodontics

Background:

• Reprocessing of endodontic files is crucial for preventing cross-contamination.
• Established hygiene guidelines exist from the German Federal Ministry of Health.
• Compliance with these guidelines among dental practitioners requires evaluation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the implementation of hygiene guidelines for reprocessing endodontic files.
• To determine the time dentists spend on instrument reprocessing.
• To identify adherence rates to national hygiene standards.

Main Methods:

• A questionnaire survey was distributed to 4,000 German dentists.
• Data collected included demographics, reprocessing time, and adherence to specific cleaning procedures.
• Statistical analysis used the Chi-square test and Cramer's V for representativeness and significance.

Main Results:

• A response rate of 29.4% (1,118 usable questionnaires) was achieved, representative of German dentists by age and gender.
• Only 31.7% of dentists fully adhered to the hygiene guidelines; 68.3% did not.
• 68.1% reported spending over nine minutes on cleaning instrument sets, and 5% treated files as single-use.

Conclusions:

• Hygiene guidelines for cleaning, disinfecting, and sterilizing endodontic files are significantly disregarded in Germany.
• Adherence rates do not differ significantly based on dentist age or gender.
• The practice of designating endodontic files as single-use instruments warrants consideration.