Comparison between Silk Sutures and Cyanoacrylate Adhesive in Human Mucosa- A Clinical and Histological Study.

Background: Closing the surgical incision is an important step in the surgical procedures, the success of surgery is sometimes compromised by the defective suturing techniques or improper suturing materials, black silk sutures are more or less most often used materials in the day today surgical procedures, but these suture materials demand more time and effort from the surgeon and there is a need to substitute these materials with more user friendly and more successful wound closing materials such as cyanoacrylates. This study intends to compare effectiveness of the black silk sutures with cyanoacrylate adhesives in closing the surgical incisions.

Materials & Methods: 10 patients of age group between 15-30 years who underwent bilateral apicoetomy were given 3-0 black silk sutures on one side and n-butyl-2cyanoacrylate adhesive on the other side of the frenum to close the surgical incision, and a clinical comparison was made on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 7th post-operative days, on the seventh postoperative day following removal of sutures, small punch biopsies were obtained from both the sites and the tissue specimens were examined under transmission electron microscope.

Results: Clinical observations revealed that on the 3rd and 7th postoperative days epithelialization was better on the sides treated with n-butyl-2cyanoacrylate but the sites closed with black silk suture showed significant inflammation and scar formation , electron microscopic observation of both tissue specimens revealed that sutured tissue specimens showed dense inflammatory infiltrate but the sites treated with cyanoacrylate adhesive showed less inflammatory infiltrate and uniform distribution of neutrophils, lymphocytes, histocytes and eosinophils unlike the sutured specimens which showed more scar tissue and dense infiltrate concentrated along the margins of the gap.

Conclusion: This study has indicated that the use of cyanoacrylate glue has resulted in less postoperative inflammation and good clinical and histological healing when compared to the silk sutures. How to cite this article: Kumar MS, Natta S, Shankar G, Reddy SH, Visalakshi D, Seshiah GV. Comparison between Silk Sutures and Cyanoacrylate Adhesive in Human Mucosa- A Clinical and Histological Study. J Int Oral Health 2013;5(5):95-100.