Efficacy of doxycycline release collagen membrane on surgically created and contaminated defects in rat tibiae: A histopathological and microbiological study.

Background: The effects of systemic antibiotics on controlling infective pathogens after guided bone regeneration(GBR) procedures especially in membrane exposures are limited. However, local administrations of antibiotics are rare in GBR techniques.

Aim: The aim of this study was to investigate the osteogenesis potential and the antibacterial effect of a doxycycline releasing collagen membrane in surgically created and contaminated defects in rat tibiae.

Material And Methods: Defects were created in 20 rats that were randomly divided in to two groups: control group (defect contaminated by Porphyromonas gingivalis, filled with bone graft and covered by collagen membrane); test group (defect contaminated by P. gingivalis filled with bone graft and covered by collagen membrane containing 1mg/cm(2) doxycycline. Animals were sacrificed post surgically on the 14th day for microbiologic evaluation and on the 28th day for histopathological evaluation.

Results: The degree of osteogenesis in the test group was seen to be significantly higher than control group (p: 0.011; p<0.05). Furthermore in test group, no bacterial growth was observed. The bacteria counts were determined between 1×104 and 268×104CFU/g with a median of 1.32×104 for control group.

Conclusions: Within the limitations of this study, the results of the present study suggests that the use of a doxycycline releasing membrane has a positive effect on contaminated GBR procedures for limiting P. gingivalis infections leading to bone formation following GBR procedures in a rat model.