Evaluation of the effect of dental cements on fracture resistance and fracture mode of teeth restored with various dental posts: A finite element analysis

Endodontic treatments of teeth with post-core systems is generally accompanied by increased brittle fracture of the restored teeth. This research aimed to evaluate the combined effect of dental posts and luting cements on fracture resistance and failure mode of the endodontically-treated teeth. Sixty endodontically-treated upper central incisors were randomly restored using titanium, fiber, or stainless steel posts and luted by zinc phosphate or composite resin cements. The teeth were then thermocycled and loaded at 135° until failures were observed. Moreover, a three-dimensional model of teeth was analyzed using the finite element method to compare the stress distributions generated by different post-core systems. The results showed that zinc phosphate cement provided relatively higher fracture resistances, whereas luting with composite resin resulted in more restorable failures. Moreover, the teeth restored by fiber posts exhibited desirable fracture resistances with more restorable failure modes, compared to those treated by stainless steel or titanium posts.