Cementogenesis and soft tissue attachment after citric acid treatment in a human. An electron microscopic study

The four maxillary incisors and two maxillary premolars of a 25-year-old male patient were used to study epithelial and connective tissue attachment 67 days and 164 days after flap surgery and cutting of an horizontal intradentinal groove near the buccal cervical region. Three teeth were topically conditioned for 3 minutes with citric acid pH = 1. The three other teeth were used as controls. The histologic examination was carried out in double-blind conditions; the examiners did not know which specimens were acid treated until the end of the study. Two of the three cases treated with citric acid showed improved healing conditions, when compared to the controls; a more coronal position of the epithelial attachment in the dentin nick as well as a relatively important gain in connective tissue attachment. Two types of connective tissue attachment were observed. The first consisted of an attachment to dentin, without cementum formation and was characterized by a mineralization of decalcified dentin collagen spliced with collagen, newly secreted by fibroblasts. The second type involved cementum formation. Topical citric acid treatment, however, can not be considered as a completely reliable clinical procedure since in one experimental case the type of attachment observed was not better than that seen in the control.