In Vitro Evaluation of The Antibacterial Effect of Three Endodontic Sealers

Abstract

The use of an endodontic sealer that possess antimicrobial activity has been long advocated as an ideal requirement since even after thorough cleaning and shaping of root canals it can still test positive for bacterial presence, thus every effort is made to try to eliminate persisting bacteria in order to maximize the overall success of endodontic therapy. The aim of this study was to evaluate the antibacterial efficacy of bioceramic sealer Totalfill BC sealer, epoxy resin based sealer AH Plus and zinc oxide eugenol sealer Endofill in vitro against Enterococcus faecalis using direct contact test (DCT). Direct contact test was carried out as described in literature where each mixed sealer was placed on the side wall of 10 wells in 96-well microtiter plate, 4 microtiter plates were prepared in the same manner at the same time to test the sealers before setting (20 minutes after mixing) and after setting at different time intervals which were 1, 4, 7 days. The microtiter plates were kept in a vertical position and 10 µL bacterial suspension from an overnight culture was placed directly on the tested sealer and left