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J Am Dent Assoc, Vol 139, No 3, 271-278.
© 2008 American Dental Association | ![]() |
COVER STORY |
A Review of the Evidence
| ABSTRACT |
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Methods. The authors searched electronic databases for comparative studies examining bacteria levels in sealed permanent teeth. To measure the effect of sealants on bacteria levels, they used the log10 reduction in mean total viable bacteria counts (VBC) between sealed and not-sealed caries and the percentage reduction in the proportion of samples with viable bacteria.
Results. Six studies—three randomized controlled trials, two controlled trials and one before-and-after study—were included in the analysis. Although studies varied considerably, there were no findings of significant increases in bacteria under sealants. Sealing caries was associated with a 100-fold reduction in mean total VBC (four studies, 138 samples). Sealants reduced the probability of viable bacteria by about 50.0 percent (four studies, 117 samples).
Conclusions. The authors found that sealants reduced bacteria in carious lesions, but that in some studies, low levels of bacteria persisted. These findings do not support reported concerns about poorer outcomes associated with inadvertently sealing caries.
Clinical Implications. Practitioners should not be reluctant to provide sealants—an intervention proven to be highly effective in preventing caries—because of concerns about inadvertently sealing over caries.
Key Words: Pit-and-fissure sealants; caries; bacteria
Abbreviations: CFU: Colony-forming unit. DEJ: Dentinoenamel junction. GIC: Glass-ionomer cement. RBS: Resin-based sealant. RCT: Randomized controlled trial. VBC: Viable bacteria count.
Strong evidence shows that sealants are effective in preventing caries in children at varying degrees of risk.1,2 Despite this evidence of effectiveness, sealant prevalence among lower-income children (who are at higher risk of experiencing dental caries) remains at around 30 percent,3 well below the Healthy People 2010 objective of 50 percent.4 Survey data of dentists suggest that one of the major barriers to their providing sealants is concern about inadvertently sealing over caries.5,6 This concern has become an obstacle to implementation of school-based sealant programs (Association of State and Territorial Dental Directors, unpublished data, 2005). Documenting the effectiveness of placing sealants over existing caries, thus, is important, because such documentation could remove a barrier to providing a proven intervention.
Dental caries is an infectious and transmissible disease, caused by cariogenic bacteria of the oral cavity, specifically those colonizing the surfaces of teeth.7–10 Caries lesions may be caused by a range of bacteria, but principal among the cariogenic flora are the mutans streptococci and lactobacilli.7,10 It long has been hypothesized that sealing an existing lesion from contact with the oral fluids should lead to eventual reduction and even death of these organisms and, thereby, should arrest the lesions progress.11 Accordingly, the fate of bacteria in caries lesions that are purposely sealed over has been of great interest to researchers and clinicians alike.
Therefore, we undertook a systematic review of the evidence regarding the effectiveness of sealants in stabilizing or reducing bacteria levels in caries lesions. This study is part of a larger systematic review that examined the effectiveness of sealants in managing caries in the pits and fissures of permanent teeth. Another report from this review found that dental sealants reduced the probability of caries progression by more than 70 percent compared with untreated control teeth.12
Identification of studies.
Details of our search strategy and results have been described elsewhere.12 Two reviewers (B.G. and S.G.) independently examined the titles and abstracts of the 1,905 unique records identified in our search for primary studies or systematic or narrative reviews of the effectiveness of sealants in preventing or treating caries. Of these records, we ordered 262 articles; from our examination of their references, we ordered an additional 49 articles, for a total of 311.
Study selection.
Three reviewers (B.G., S.G. and W.K.) reached a consensus that of these 311 articles, 26 studies should be evaluated further. These three reviewers rejected seven studies for inclusion for the following reasons: they were case studies, lacked appropriate outcomes or did not include both baseline and follow-up examinations. Of the 19 studies included in the larger systematic review, nine included data on bacteria levels under sealed carious lesions; of these nine studies, six had sufficient data from which to calculate outcome measures. The Quality of Reporting of Meta-Analyses Flow Diagram for the original, larger study has been published elsewhere.12
Data abstraction and quality assessment.
Two reviewers (S.G. and E.O.) abstracted studies by using a modified version of a form developed for the National Institutes of Health Caries Consensus Development Conference in 2001.12 This form was used in a systematic review of methods to manage caries.13 We made one notable modification to the form to collect detailed information about bacteria-sampling methodology. The abstractors collected information to document study quality (in terms of such characteristics as study design, dropout rate, examiner blinding and bacteria-sampling methodology).
Outcome measures.
We used two outcomes—mean viable bacteria count (VBC) as measured with colony-forming units per milligram (CFU/mg) and percentage of samples with VBC greater than zero—to measure activity for total bacteria, Streptococcus mutans and lactobacilli. To evaluate the effect of sealants on mean VBC, we examined the change in log10 mean VBC (= log10 mean VBCSEALED – log10 mean VBCNOT-SEALED, where a log10 mean VBC value of 6 equals 1 x 106, or 1,000,000 CFU) and whether the difference in mean VBC for sealed and unsealed teeth was significant (P < .05). To measure the effect of sealants on the percentage of samples with VBC greater than zero, we used the percentage change in proportion of samples having VBC greater than zero:
Synthesis of findings.
We report the overall median and mean effect measures across all studies. We did not calculate confidence intervals for these summary measures because we included multiple observations from the same study, so observations likely were not independent.
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METHODS
TOP
ABSTRACT
METHODS
RESULTS
DISCUSSION
CONCLUSION
REFERENCES
Inclusion criteria.
This analysis was part of a broader systematic review of sealant effectiveness in known carious lesions in the pits and fissures of permanent teeth. Initially, we included all in vivo studies published in English that compared outcomes, such as caries progression or bacteria levels, in permanent teeth treated with sealants with outcomes in permanent teeth not treated with sealants. Comparisons could involve concurrent randomized controlled trials (RCTs), controlled trials or cohort studies (prospective or retrospective) or studies conducted across time (before-and-after, time series) in the same groups. In this analysis, we included comparative studies that examined bacteria viability in sealed carious lesions. There were no restrictions regarding study populations.

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RESULTS
TOP
ABSTRACT
METHODS
RESULTS
DISCUSSION
CONCLUSION
REFERENCES
Description of studies.
Of the six studies14–19 used to calculate outcome measures in this analysis (representing 303 bacteria samples), two studies were RCTs,17,18 one was a subgroup analysis of an RCT of split-mouth design,14 two were controlled trials that did not mention randomization15,16 and one was of a before-and-after design (in which the same tooth was sampled before and after sealant placement)19 (Table 1
).
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Sealant effectiveness: total bacteria.
We used results from four studies (18 observation points across five years representing 254 samples) to examine the effect of sealants on VBC.14–16,19 There were no findings of significant increases in total bacteria under sealants. The reduction in log10 mean VBC at the last period in each study was approximately three in two studies15,16 and two in the remaining two studies14,19 (one of these two studies reported the median not the mean value). The overall median and mean reductions were 3.01 and 2.56 (138 samples), respectively (Table 2
, page 275), and appeared to increase as time since sealant placement increased. Mean total VBC was lower for sealed teeth than for unsealed teeth in the three studies that tested for statistical significance.14–16
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Two studies14,19 provided data on lactobacilli counts (two observations across time representing 68 samples; data not shown). The reduction in log10 mean and median VBC was 1.75. The reduction was significant in the one study that tested for statistical significance.14 In both studies, the percentage of samples with lactobacilli was lower for sealed teeth than for unsealed teeth. The percentage reduction in probability of viable lactobacilli was 37 percent.
| DISCUSSION |
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Bacterial activity, as measured by a reduction in log10 mean VBC or the percentage of cultivable samples, decreased with time in all studies that had multiple follow-up periods.15–17 Results of one study showed a linear decrease in mean log10 VBC across time.16 Since bacteria decreased across time, the findings of this review suggest that retained sealants deprive bacteria of access to nutrients in the substrate. Furthermore, it appears that bacteria that persist under sealants cannot produce acid when isolated from the carbohydrate substrate and, thus, adequately sealed lesions are unlikely to progress. Another analysis of studies included in the larger systematic review that supported this report on bacteria levels under sealants found that sealing noncavitated lesions reduced the probability of lesion progression by more than 70 percent.12
The importance of adequately sealing a carious lesion is further supported by the finding that retained sealants regardless of material were effective. Studies included in this review used a variety of sealant materials: RBS polymerized by visible or ultraviolet light, autopolymerized RBS and GIC. Of the six studies that used RBS,14–19 five reported retention rates,14–17,19 and in these studies, retention was 100 percent. For the one study that also used GIC, full retention was 0 percent, but in all lesions, the opening remained sealed at follow-up.19 Because the opening remained sealed, we cannot determine if the effectiveness of GIC was attributable to the isolation of bacteria from nutrients in the substrate, the release of fluoride into the dentin or a combination of both factors. It is hypothesized that release of fluoride from GIC contributes to primary caries prevention.20 However, the clinical effect of fluoride release from GIC is not well-established; a systematic review showed insufficient evidence to recommend GIC for the primary prevention of dental caries.2 Interestingly, one study reported that fissures with caries retained sealants better than did apparently intact fissures.14
The larger systematic review found two additional studies providing evidence that sealants are effective in reducing bacteria viability. The first study,21 which was published in 1943, examined bacteria levels in caries sealed with base-plate gutta-percha packed down tightly and then in turn covered by zinc oxyphosphate cement. Results from this study showed that lactobacilli died out in all cases between two and 10 months after sealing and that streptococcus test results remained positive in more than one-third of the teeth studied after having been sealed for more than one year. Another study, an RCT, compared sealing bacteria in carious dentin with GIC restorative material with sealing bacteria with amalgam.22 This study found that at six months, both materials inhibited caries progression as measured by total counts of bacteria, S. mutans and lactobacilli but that a larger decrease in S. mutans and lactobacilli resulted from GIC use.
Other studies document that at least two other species of bacteria can persist even when deprived of nutrients.23,24 These species enter a starvation state, which allows bacterial long-term persistence in a nongrowing but cultivable state for at least two months. Further research is needed to determine how long cariogenic bacteria can persist when isolated from nutrients. The longest period for studies included in this review was five years; however, current data suggest that a sizable number of sealants are retained for almost twice that time.25 One additional argument for the effectiveness of sealants in reducing bacterial activity is the fact that fissures in sound teeth harbor cariogenic bacteria and that, because these sealed teeth remain caries-free in most instances, these sealed-over bacteria either perish or are no longer metabolically active. Study results indicate that some teeth still have a considerable number of bacteria remaining even after acid etching.14,17
One limitation of this review was that all included studies were conducted before 2000. The sole criterion for bacterial viability in these studies was cultivability. Since that time, microbiological quantification and characterization have become DNA-based, obviating the need for cultivation, which captures only the cultivable minority of microorganisms present.26 Another limitation was that one outcome measure reported in four studies, mean VBC, is sensitive to outlying values.14–16,19 As a result, mean VBC typically are transformed to log10 values, and the mean then is calculated for these transformed values. However, investigators in two of the three studies that found that mean VBC were lower in sealed teeth performed their statistical testing on transformed values.15,17 Further research is needed with studies that meet current standards in design and conduct.
Our findings do not support reported concerns about poorer outcomes associated with inadvertently sealing caries and should lessen practitioners reluctance to provide sealants—an intervention proven to be highly effective in preventing caries. Indeed, although study conduct varied considerably, there were no findings of significant increases in bacteria under sealants.
| CONCLUSION |
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| FOOTNOTES |
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| REFERENCES |
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This article has been cited by other articles:
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Response from the ADA Council on Scientific Affairs J Am Dent Assoc, June 1, 2008; 139(6): 662 - 664. [Full Text] [PDF] |
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J. Beauchamp, P. W. Caufield, J. J. Crall, K. Donly, R. Feigal, B. Gooch, A. Ismail, W. Kohn, M. Siegal, and R. Simonsen Evidence-Based Clinical Recommendations for the Use of Pit-and-Fissure Sealants: A Report of the American Dental Association Council on Scientific Affairs J Am Dent Assoc, March 1, 2008; 139(3): 257 - 268. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF] |
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