Objectives: This investigation was a longitudinal, randomized clinical trial to measure the clinical performance of a nano-ceramic material (Lava Ultimate/3M) for chairside Computer Assisted Design/Computer Assisted Machining (CAD/CAM) fabricated restorations.
Materials and methods: One hundred and twenty chairside CAD/CAM onlays were restored with a CEREC system randomly assigned to 60 leucite-reinforced ceramic (IPS EmpressCAD/Ivoclar Vivadent AGBendererstrasse 2FL-9494 SchaanLiechtenstein) onlays and 60 nano-ceramic (Lava Ultimate/3M) onlays. Equal groups of onlays were cemented using a self-etch and a total etch adhesive resin cement. The onlays were recalled for a period of 5 years.
Results: At 1 week postoperatively, 10% of the onlays cemented with both the self-etch and total etch adhesive resin cements were reported as slightly sensitive. However, all patients were asymptomatic by the 4th week without treatment. Four leucite-reinforced onlays and one nano-ceramic onlay fractured and required replacement.
Conclusions: Adhesive retention with a self-etch or total etch cementation technique resulted in a similar clinical outcome with no reported debonds. The nano-ceramic onlays had a lower incidence of fracture compared to the leucite-reinforced ceramic onlays with both having a very low risk of fracture. Nano-ceramic onlays performed equally as well as glass ceramic onlays over 5 years of clinical service.
Clinical significance: Ceramic materials have been a mainstay for chairside CAD/CAM restorations for the past 30 years and a new category of resilient ceramics with a resin matrix has been introduced reported to offer ceramic-like durability and esthetics with resin-like efficiency in handling. There are no long-term clinical studies on the performance of these materials. This is a 5-year randomized clinical trial on the performance of nano-ceramic onlays.
Keywords: CAD/CAM; CEREC; ceramic; nano-ceramic; onlays.
© 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.