Early Failures in Root Canal Treatment: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Background: Root canal treatment is a boon in preserving teeth affected by apical odontitis. This procedure shows a fair success rate with lots of patients reporting alleviation of pain. However, the presence of some factors could be contributors of failure. Aim and objective: The primary question that we aimed to answer was:” What are the factors for failure in root canal treatment and how to identify the significant association between the covariates?”. Methods: The data was retrieved from PubMed and Google Scholar from 2018 to 2024 and 18053 records were identified. After exclusion based on title and abstract, full text screening along with duplicate removal initially, ten studies were considered for the systematic review and meta-analysis finally. Results: Males, young adults, molar and under filled tooth showed higher rates of failure in root canal treatment. Pain and sinus came out to be the major factors indicating failure. Missing canal and instrument related factors were some of the major causes for the failure. The C shaped canal usually found in mandibular and second molar leads to failure. Conclusion: Peri apical radiolucency can particularly be used as an indicator to assess failure and cone beam computed tomography specially will prove to be beneficial in diagnosis to prevent such failures.