Does cracked tooth develop dental pulp inflammation? a study of dental pulp cell response to mechanical loading from tooth 3d modeling

The incidence of cracked tooth syndrome (CTS) became common dental problems. The CTS refers to a partial fracture of a tooth, involving enamel, dentin. The bite force on the cracked tooth may increase the magnitude of the mechanical stress exerted onto the pulp, which may lead to pulp inflammation and necrosis. Predictive numerical simulation models can shed important insight into how dental pulp undergoes irreversible pulp inflammation in response to mechanical loading. The Finite element analysis model showed the crack of the tooth extended to dentin can lead to increase of mechanical stress in dental pulp. This suggested that, to void the damage to the dental pulp, proper intervention such as dental crowns is recommended. This study implicated the possibility of using FEA to help predicting the pulp viability in CTS in clinical situation.