Lasers for the treatment of dentin hypersensitivity: A meta-analysis

This systematic review and meta-analysis assessed the efficacy of lasers in reducing dentin hypersensitivity (dh) as compared with placebo or no treatment. seven electronic databases and a manual search resulted in 2,538 unique publications. after selection,13 studies were included in the meta-analysis. a consort-based quality assessment revealed that 3 and 10 studies were at low and high risk of bias,respectively. a random-effects model with the generic inverse variance standardized mean difference (smd) was used because of expected heterogeneity. meta-analyses of the baseline-end of follow-up changes in pain revealed no differences for er,cr:yssg vs. placebo (smd = 2.49; 95% ci,-0.25 to 5.22; p =.07) but did reveal differences in favor of lasers for er:yag vs. placebo (smd,2.65; 95% ci,1.25 to 4.05; p =.0002),nd:yag vs. placebo (smd,3.59; 95% ci,0.49 to 6.69; p =.02),and gaalas vs. placebo (smd,3.40; 95% ci,1.93 to 4.87; p <.00001). high and significant heterogeneity was found for all comparisons. in conclusion,er:yag,nd:yag,and gaalas lasers appear to be efficacious in reducing dh. however,given the high heterogeneity of the included studies,future randomized controlled clinical trials are needed to confirm these results. © international & american associations for dental research.