AVALIAÇÃO DA EFICÁCIA DO MÉTODO DE ESTERILIZAÇÃO PELO CALOR SECO E CALOR ÚMIDO EM SUGADORES ENDODÔNTICOS REUTILIZÁVEIS EFFECTIVENESS OF DRY HEAT AND STEAM STERILIZATION PROCEDURES ON REUSABLE ENDODONTIC ASPIRATORS

An important cause of spread of infection from one patient to another is the use of contaminated dental instruments. This study investigated the effectiveness of cleaning and sterilization procedures to sterilize metallic endodontic aspirators used in patients treated by students of endodontics in the School of Dentistry at the Pontifi cal Catholic University of Minas Gerais. Following use, the instruments were mechanically cleaned in an ultrasonic cleaner. For microbiological evaluation, the interior lumen of each endodontic aspirator was fl ushed with 1ml of sterile saline solution. Amounts of 0.2 mL from each specimen were spread onto Brain Heart Infusion (BHI) broth. The agar plates were incubated aerobically at 37oC for 48h. Plates were examined for colony morphology and colony-forming units per millilitre (CFU/mL) were calculated. Ninety nine endodontic aspirators were sterilized by steam sterilization (autoclave). One hundred instruments were subjected to dry heat sterilization. Twenty two new unused endodontic aspirators were used as control. The results demonstrated that of 100 endodontic aspirators subjected to dry heat sterilization 14 were deemed biologically contaminated. Bacteria could be detected from 10 of 99 endodontic aspirators subjected to a steam sterilization cycle. This present work showed that cleaning and sterilization procedures were ineffective to eliminate microorganisms from reusable endodontic aspirators. These instruments should not be used in the clinical practices in the School of Dentistry at PUC Minas.