Agreement between clinical and histologic findings in chronic coronal pulpitis in primary teeth

Pulpotomy, a common endodontic procedure in primary teeth, is usually performed because of carious exposure of the pulp, which means that at least a part of the pulp is chronically inflamed. A favorable outcome of pulpotomy combined with the use of calcium hydroxide presupposes that the root pulp is healthy. No wound dressing is known to induce healing of chronically inflamed pulp tissue. 37 primary teeth with no clinical or radiographic symptoms of total chronic pulpitis were extracted and the pulp was studied histologically by light microscopy. The histologic diagnosis of a healthy root pulp was based on absence of any infiltration of mononuclear lymphocytes. Agreement between the clinical and histologic diagnosis was found in 30 out of 37 teeth.