Effect of dental antiseptic agents on the viability of human periodontal ligament cells

Abstract

ObjectivesWe aimed to study whether or not various dental antiseptic agents affect the viability and proliferation of human periodontal ligament cells (PDLCs). Materials and methodsHuman PDLCs were isolated from a total of 10 surgically extracted impacted third molars and were.cultured in-vitro. The cells were exposed to commonly used dental antiseptics, including chlorhexidine, cetylpyridinium chloride, triclosan, povidone-iodine and sodium bicarbonate for ultra-short-term (10, 20, 30 sec), short-term (10, 20, 30 min) and long-term (24, 48 h) at various concentrations. Cell morphology was observed with light microscopy. Cell viability was studied with impedimetric real-time xCELLigence and resazurin-based alamarBlue® assays. We used one-way ANOVA with Tukey’s and Bonferroni test (p < 0.05) for statistical analysis. ResultsBoth alamarBlue® and xCELLigence analysis results were in agreement that ultra-short-term contact with cetylpyridinium chloride ≥ 0.01 mg/ml, chlorhexidine ≥ 1 mg/ml, triclosan ≥ 1 mg/ml and povidone-iodine ≥ 1 mg/ml as well as long-term exposure to cetylpyridinium chloride ≥ 0.001 mg/ml, chlorhexidine ≥ 0.01 mg/ml, triclosan ≥ 1 mg/ml, povidone-iodine ≥ 1 mg/ml and sodium bicarbonate ≥ 10 mg/ml was able to reduce the viability of human PDLCs significantly. According to the half-maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) the rank of cytotoxicity was cetylpyridinium chloride > chlorhexidine > triclosan > povidone-iodine > sodium bicarbonate. ConclusionsOur findings suggest that the tested antiseptic agents were cytotoxic to human PDLCs at lower than practically applied concentrations in dental interventions.