Pulp capping with mineral trioxide aggregate (MTA): a retrospective analysis of carious pulp exposures treated by undergraduate dental students.

The current study estimated pulpal vitality after MTA pulp caps were performed by undergraduate student clinicians. At recall after 12 to 27 months, 51 pulp caps were clinically and radiographically assessed. Kaplan-Meier analyses were used to estimate overall success at 12 and 24 months, determined as the presence of a vital pulp, as well as impact of preoperative variables on pulp vitality at recall. Overall, one-year pulp survival was 67.7%, while the two-year survival rate was 56.2%. Tarone-Ware statistics indicated that neither age of the patient nor size of the exposure ("minimal" or "moderate") and the amount of bleeding ("none," "minimal" or "moderate") had a significant effect on survival rates. Within the limitations of the current study on procedures performed by student clinicians, it may be concluded that, for MTA pulp caps applied to carious exposures in adults, certain preoperative conditions--patient age, exposure size and amount of bleeding--are not predictive of clinical outcome. Considering the comparatively low success rate for the current cohort, more research is needed to define predictive criteria for successful pulp capping with MTA.