Antimicrobial Effectiveness of Chloramphenicol and Sodium Hypochlorite for Root Canal Irrigation

Root canal therapy, root canal cleaning and its obturation are applied to prevent root canal reinfection. In the root canal treatment, irrigants are applied to reduce the bacteria in root canal spaces. Therefore, this study aimed to compare antimicrobial effects of chloramphenicol and sodium hypochlorite as root canal irrigants.

In this in-vitro study, after removing the crowns, 44 extracted human teeth were sterilized in autoclave and were also incubated in inoculated culture with Enterococcus faecalis for three weeks. The teeth were divided into two groups of 20 and one group of 4 (Control). Canals were then instrumentated with step back technique. Canals in group 1 were irrigated with NaOCL 5.25%, group 2 with Chloramphenicol 0.5% and group 3 with Normal Salin. Then the sample was obtained by paper cone from root canal and put in experimental tube containing BHI. The contents of tubes were cultured on plates of Blood agar. Colony forming units of bacteria were counted in 37C after 24h. The study data were analyzed via SPSS software (version,17) applying Mann-Whitney and Kruskal-wallis tests.

There was no statistically significant difference between Sodium hypochlorite and Chloramphenicol(PV=0.264) groups in regard with the mean number of the grown colonies. In fact, both groups revealed more significant antimicrobial effects than that of the control group. (PV<0.001).

Antimicrobial effect of Chloramphenicol is comparable to Sodium Hypochlorite, though more investigations are needed for its clinical application.