Introduction: This study evaluates the use of naproxen sodium before injection of inferior alveolar nerve block in symptomatic mandibular molars with irreversible pulp inflammation, to increase the success rate of anesthesia, thus reducing patient’s pain. Materials and methods: Sixty patients with molars affected with symptomatic irreversible pulpitis were randomly selected for this double-blind study based on a placebo and a control group. All patients were given similar capsules containing 550 mg of naproxen sodium or placebo one hour before the usual inferior alveolar nerve block injection. Lip anesthesia was recorded in all patients. Success was defined as absence or low pain, based on the visual analog scale during cavity preparation and instrumentation. Data was analyzed with the Mann-Whitney test. Results and discussion: The success rate in the naproxen sodium group was 16.7% and 6.7% in the placebo group, the difference being not statistically significant (p=0.23). Our study shows that pretreatment with naproxen sodium does not increase the success of anesthesia of the mandibular alveolar nerve block during the treatment of mandibular molars with irreversible pulp inflammation, compared with placebo. There is no significant difference between age and sex characteristics in the two groups. Therefore, these factors did not affect treatment outcomes. There was no significant difference between the amounts of pain before taking the drug or placebo (all patients had severe pain, according to the research method). Conclusions: The present study showed that pretreatment with naproxen sodium did not increase the success rate of inferior alveolar nerve block injection or patient’s depth of anesthesia at work. According to it, pre-treatment with 550 mg naproxen sodium did not improve the success of inferior alveolar nerve block in mandibular molars with symptomatic irreversible pulp inflammation. It is suggested that more research is necessary on the effect of drug therapy in increasing the depth of anesthesia of inferior alveolar nerve block injection with the help of other drugs.
Keywords:- inferior alveolar nerve
- mandibular molars
- naproxen sodium
- pulp inflammation.