For teeth requiring endodontic treatment, what are the differences in outcomes of restored endodontically treated teeth compared to implant-supported restorations?
OBJECTIVE
The clinical question this systematic review aimed to answer was "What are the differences in outcomes of restored endodontically treated teeth compared to implant-supported restorations? Therefore the aim of this study was to use systematic review to compare the survival of compromised teeth restored with either root canal therapy followed by a crown, or placement of a single-tooth implant.


METHODS
MEDLINE, EMBASE, and PubMed databases were searched for studies dealing with survival of single-tooth implants and restored endodontically treated teeth. A 2-step screening procedure was used to identify articles that met the inclusion/exclusion criteria. Fifty-five studies related to single-tooth implants and 13 studies related to restored root canal-treated teeth were included. The endpoint analyzed in these studies was the survival rate of the treated tooth or implant.


RESULTS
The 95% confidence intervals for the pooled estimates for the single-tooth implants and restored endodontically treated teeth were found overlapping in forest plots for all follow-up periods. This indicated no significant differences in survival between restored root canal-treated teeth and single-tooth implants.


CONCLUSIONS
The results of this systematic review indicate that the decision to treat a tooth endodontically or replace it with an implant must be based on factors other than the treatment outcomes of the procedures themselves. Both nonsurgical root canal therapy followed by an appropriate restoration and single-tooth implants are excellent treatment modalities for the treatment of compromised teeth.
Iqbal
Mian K
MK
Postgraduate Program in Endodontics, Department of Endodontics, University of Pennsylvania, Robert Schattner Center, 240 South 40th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. miqbal@pobox.upenn.edu
Kim
Syngcuk
S
D003442:Crowns; D000044:Dental Abutments; D015921:Dental Implants; D017267:Dental Prosthesis Design; D019094:Dental Prosthesis, Implant-Supported; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D012390:Root Canal Therapy; D016019:Survival Analysis; D019553:Tooth, Nonvital / Q000628:therapy*; D016896:Treatment Outcome
D015921:Dental Implants