Preoperative and operative factors associated with pain after the first endodontic visit.

Abstract

Summary. Thirteen preoperative and operative factors were investigated regarding their association with the incidence of postoperative pain after the first session of root canal treatment. The final analysis comprised 443 teeth of 443 patients. These were the teeth remaining after the original sample of 1204 teeth was reduced by the exclusion of all teeth associated with irrelevant factors which could possibly affect the analysis. The results showed that postoperative pain after the first visit occurred in 27 per cent of cases (5 per cent severe and 22 per cent moderate pain). Positive correlation occurred between the incidence of postoperative pain and several factors: the presence of preoperative pain in conjunction with a non‐vital pulp; the presence of a radiolucency larger than 5 mm in diameter; the number of root canals of the tooth treated; women reported more postoperative pain than men. Furthermore, the analysis revealed that the effects of these factors were cumulative.