Radiographic Evaluation of Densities of different Root Canal Sealers

Objectives:

The purpose of this study is to evaluate and compare the densities of four different brands of root canal sealers using three different intraoral imaging receptors.

Methods:

Four different root canal sealers used were – AH Plus, Epiphany, U/P and Apexit .The sealers were mixed according to the manufacturers instructions and four specimens of each material were fabricated using metallic matrices and stored at room temperature. Size of each specimen was 10 X 2mm. All the specimens were imaged using three different intraoral #2 sized imaging receptors-D and E speed film and storage phosphor plates. All exposures were standardized at 70kvp, 7ma and 8 impulses/second and object source distance was set at 15 inches. D and E speed films were digitized and stored in JPEG format. All the images were exported into the Image J software (rsb.info.nih.gov/ij/) and the mean grey values and integrated density of each material was calculated from four random areas of each image and averaged. Mixed model ANOVA was performed.

Results:

All tests were performed at 95% confidence intervals and the null was rejected. Pair wise comparison of mean grey values between the three imaging receptors showed high statistical significance(P=0.000 to 0.046) for all the root canal sealers (RCS).¹ Integral densities recorded by the receptors also showed high statistical significance(P=0.00 to 0.072) between the three receptors for all the four different RCS.²

Conclusion:

Our study showed that the four different types of RCS showed different densities on all the three receptors even though all our exposures were standardized and multiple sites on each image were used to calculate the mean density. Since there was high statistical significance between the RCS, it is possible to differentiate these materials on radiographic images regardless of the type of image receptor used.