Healing of intraoral wounds closed using silk sutures and isoamyl 2-cyanoacrylate glue: a comparative clinical and histologic study.

PURPOSE: To compare the clinical and histologic healing of intraoral wounds closed using No. 3-0 silk suture with that obtained with isoamyl 2-cyanoacrylate glue.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: We performed alveoloplasty in 30 cases in the mandibular anterior region of edentulous arches; the length of incision in all cases was the same distance from the midline. The closure was performed on 1 side with No. 3-0 silk suture, and the other side was closed with isoamyl 2-cyanoacrylate. The surgical sites were evaluated on the first, seventh, fourteenth, and twenty-first postoperative days for tenderness and erythema. In 15 cases (group A), incisional biopsies on both sutured and glued sides were performed on the seventh postoperative day. In the other 15 patients, similar biopsies were executed on the fourteenth postoperative day (group B). All specimens were examined under a microscope for inflammatory cell infiltration, vascularity, and fibroblastic activity.

RESULTS: The incidence of tenderness and erythema was increased on the sutured side on the first, seventh, and fourteenth postoperative days but was similar to that on the glued side on the twenty-first postoperative day. In the patients biopsied on the seventh postoperative day, values of inflammatory cell infiltration and vascularity were higher on the sutured side, whereas in patients biopsied on the fourteenth postoperative day, only vascularity was higher on the sutured side.

CONCLUSION: On the seventh postoperative day, both clinical and histologic indicators of inflammation were higher on the sutured side, but these indicators had reached similar values on the fourteenth postoperative day on both the sutured and glued sides. This suggests that isoamyl 2-cyanoacrylate may aid initial healing.