Efficiency of Castor Oil as a Storage Medium for Avulsed Teeth in Maintaining the Viability of Periodontal Ligament Cells

STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM: Researchers always seek a new storage medium for avulsed teeth. Castor oil is a vegetable oil with several advantages such as antimicrobial and antioxidant properties, low toxicity, and glutathione preservation capability, low cost, and high availability. PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to evaluate and compare the capacity of castor oil as a new storage medium in preserving the viability of periodontal ligament (PDL) cells compared to Hank’s balanced salt solution (HBSS) and milk. MATERIALS AND METHOD: Forty freshly extracted human teeth were divided into 3 experimental and 2 control groups. The experimental teeth were stored dry for 30 min and then immersed for 45 min in one of the following media; castor oil, HBSS, and milk. The positive and negative control groups were exposed to 0 min and 2 h of dry time respectively with no immersion in any storage medium. The teeth were then treated with dispase grade II and collagenase and the number of viable PDL cells were counted. Data were analyzed using Kruskal- Wallis test. RESULTS: The percentage of viable cells treated with castor oil, HBSS and milk counted immediately after removal from these media were 46.93, 51.02 and 55.10 % respectively. The statistical analysis revealed that the value for castor oil was significantly lower than HBSS and milk (p> 0.05). CONCLUSION: Within the parameters of this study, it appears that castor oil cannot be served as an ideal medium for storage of avulsed tooth. More investigations under in vivo conditions are required to justify the results of this study.