Evidence Hub

Effectiveness of passive ultrasonic irrigation on periapical healing and root canal disinfection: a systematic review

Silva EJNL, Rover G, Belladonna FG, Herrera DR, De-Deus G, da Silva Fidalgo TK

British dental journal, 2019

Abstract

Objectives To evaluate the effectiveness of passive ultrasonic irrigation (PUI) compared with non-activated irrigation (NAI) on periapical healing and root canal disinfection.Data source A comprehensive search without restrictions was performed in the following systematic electronic databases: PubMed, Scopus, Cochrane, Web of Science, ScienceDirect and OpenGrey. Additional studies were sought through hand-searching in the main endodontic journals.Data selection We included clinical trials that compared PUI and NAI clinical success and root canal disinfection outcomes. The risk of bias was assessed based on the Cochrane Collaboration common scheme for bias assessment. The power analysis of each study was calculated based on the disinfection rates and sample size, and the evidence was qualified using the GRADE tool.Data synthesis A total of 346 non-duplicated studies were retrieved in the systematic search. One study that assessed the clinical success rate through periapical radiographic healing evaluation and two studies that evaluated root canal disinfection through bacterial growth were considered eligible. These three studies were classified as low risk of bias. The study evaluating radiographic treatment outcome showed no statistical difference (P >0.05). The studies demonstrated large variability among methodology and, in general, low power and moderate evidence. Inconclusive results were reported regarding root canal disinfection when comparing PUI to NAI…

How strong is the evidence?

Evidence Hub reads this as a systematic review, done in people. Its evidence level is 1 of 5 (Highest · pooled evidence). Pooled evidence from several studies sits at the top of the evidence pyramid.

How the five levels of evidence work. The level is assigned automatically from the abstract and can be wrong, so check the paper.

Read the paper

Related studies

Go deeper in Evidence Hub

Evidence Hub adds a study data sheet (design, sample size, evidence level, key numbers), an AI summary and a chat grounded in the paper's text.

Open this study Sign up free