Should atraumatic restorative treatment be the preferred treatment for older patients?

Design Randomised controlled trial study.Case selection Ninety-nine subjects were chosen from 219 potential subjects. The 99 who met the inclusion criteria were randomly allocated to two treatment groups: atraumatic restorative treatment (ART) and conventional treatment (CT). To be selected, patients needed to be 65 years or over, follow oral hygiene guidance and have one or more painless dentinal carious lesions. To establish suitability, a full dental examination was performed by two calibrated dentists. Prior to receiving ART or CT, all participants received standard dental care (including extractions, non-surgical treatment and oral hygiene instructions). Following ART or CT, a dental nurse collected data regarding patient treatment preferences and a calibrated independent dentist, blind to the treatment allocation, reviewed restorations six months, one year, two years and five years after treatment.Data analysis The Cox proportional-hazards (PH) model was used to assess the cumulative survival of the variables ART and CT between the intervals. Bootstrapping was employed to estimate standard errors since the multiple restorations required by many patients were not necessarily independent of each other.Results Of the 99 subjects included, only 28 (ART: 15, CT: 13) remained after five years. After five years, of the 300 restorations undertaken, 15 ART restorations and 16 CT restorations failed. The cumulative probability of restoration survival was 85% and 79% (p = 0.8095) for ART and CT, respectively, with the Cox PH model showing the treatment used had no effect on the restorations' survival.Conclusions No significant difference was noted between the treatment methods used in terms of survival of the restorations. However, it is worth noting that 64.5% of participants preferred to have dental treatment without local anaesthesia and 71.1% without the use of a dental drill. Therefore, ART was a favourable treatment option in older patients, particularly those unable to attend the dental surgery.