Self-adhesive resin cements: a clinical review.

PURPOSE To review the performance of self-adhesive luting agents to determine their clinical evidence. MATERIALS AND METHODS In March 2013, we conducted a literature search by means of PubMed and manually searched German and English medical journals using general search terms (e.g., "self-adhesive resin cements"), detailed search terms (e.g., clinical study "self-adhesive resin cement"), and brand name search terms (clinical study AND "brand name of the cement"). The resulting lists of articles were manually searched for clinical studies. Because of the low number of relevant articles, we decided to broaden our search by including in vitro studies based on a thermal cycling and mechanical loading (TCML) design. RESULTS The search using the six general search terms yielded a list with over 100 studies with only 13 in vivo studies and 6 in vitro studies based on a TCML design. The other studies either did not comply with the requirements or were not in vitro studies based on a TCML design. Two more in vivo studies could be added after the brand name search. Altogether, 15 in vivo studies and 6 in vitro studies were included in our analysis. CONCLUSION Because of the low number of studies available, the clinical evidence of self-adhesive luting agents cannot be assessed in a sufficient manner.