A Microleakage Study of Cements with Stainless Steel Crowns

PURPOSE: To compare the ability of newer adhesive resin cements and traditional glass ionomer cements to prevent microleakage under stainless steel crowns on extracted permanent third molars. METHODS: All teeth were hand prepared and stainless steel crowns were cemented according to manufacturers\u27 instructions. The specimens were thermocycled for 500 cycles and immersed in 2% methylene blue dye solution for 8 hours. Each tooth was imbedded in resin and cut into I mm thick sections by a slow speed diamond saw. The amount of microleakage was measured in microns under a traveling microscope. The measurements of each section of a tooth were averaged and only one number was recorded per specimen. The open margin distance for each specimen was measured. Statistical methods employed were the Kruskal-Wallis rank test and the Mann-Whitney U test. RESULTS: Nexus 2 had statistically significant less microleakage than other three cements tested (p=0.0089). There was no statistically significant difference in microleakage between Ketac Cem and RelyX Unicem (p=0.0529) or between Ketac Cem and Maxcem (p=0.0535). There was also no statistically significant difference in microleakage was established between RelyX Unicem and Maxcem (p=0.0947). CONCLUSIONS: Nexus 2 had statistically significant decreases in microleakage when compared with Ketac Cem, RelyX Unicem, and Maxcem cements. There were no statistically significant differences in microleakage between the remaining three cement systems