CLINICAL LONGEVITY OF DIRECT COMPOSITE RESIN RESTORATIONS IN POSTERIOR TEETH

Abstract

This article aimed to evaluate the clinical performance and longevity of direct composite resin restorations in posterior teeth, identifying the main factors associated with clinical failures. The study is characterized as a narrative literature review, whose literature search was conducted in the PubMed, SciELO, and Google Scholar databases, prioritizing recent literature and using the following descriptors: “composite resin”, “bulk fill”, “longevity”, “posterior teeth”, “failure”, and “secondary caries”. The findings regarding long-term longevity demonstrate that, over three decades, the survival rate of these restorations remains high at 94% at 10 years and reaches 73% at the 30-year mark. The literature explored in this study converges on two main causes of failure in posterior direct composite resin restorations: secondary caries and fracture. Finally, the findings reinforce that the longevity of direct restorations in posterior teeth is multifactorial, not relying exclusively on the intrinsic properties of composite resin, which reaffirms itself as a material of excellent reliability and clinical longevity.