Comparison of the debridement efficacy of the endovac irrigation system and conventional needle root canal irrigation in vivo

Introduction: The purpose of this study was to compare the debridement efficacy of EndoVac irrigation versus conventional needle irrigation in vivo. Methods: Seven adult patients with a total of 22 matched pairs of single-canaled vital teeth with fully formed apices were recruited. Canals were instrumented to a master apical file size #40/.04 taper. One tooth from each matched pair was irrigated by using the EndoVac system. The other tooth was irrigated by conventional needle irrigation. Five additional teeth were used as positive controls. A #10 K-file was inserted into the control canals to determine working length (WL), with no other instrumentation or irrigation performed to confirm the presence of debris. The teeth were extracted, fixed, and decalcified. Six histologic slides each 6 μm thick were made from sections at 1 and 3 mm from WL and stained. The slide with the most debris was photographed at each level for each tooth. A Wilcoxon signed rank test was used to compare the percentage of debris remaining in the canals between the 2 irrigation techniques. Results: The median amount of debris remaining at 1 mm was 0.05% for the EndoVac group and 0.12% for the conventional irrigation group (P <.05). The median amount of debris remaining at 3 mm was 0.09% for the EndoVac group and 0.07% for the conventional needle irrigation group (P >.05). Conclusions: EndoVac irrigation resulted in significantly less debris at 1 mm from WL compared with conventional needle irrigation. There was no significant difference at the 3-mm level.