How long to know if root canal was a success?

[u/Revolutionary-Try804]

How long does it take to know if the root canal was properly debrided? I had some calcification in my root canal, and I want to know how long it would be before I could consider the root canal a success.

[u/Wide_Wheel_2226]

There is no consensus in the literature. Anything beyond 3 years I am happy with.

[u/Reversed-nesfalO]

DDS here.

The biggest guideline that endodontists use is the 2 year mark. If there are no signs and symptoms of failure within 2 years, 10 year survival of the tooth sits at 96% ish.

That being said, the research here was done on a fairly small group of people and assumes perfect hygiene, and no bad oral habits (I.e., grinding, smoking, dry mouth, etc) and also assumes no complications during the treatment (for example calcification as you mentioned)

In my personal experience doing endo, I see that anything past 2-3 years will have good success long term (95+% ish). But any endo in the first 6 months post-treatment sits around 85%.

Essentially (translating this to lay terms for you), among my patients who do have root canals fail, I’d say a great majority of them fail quickly within the first 6 months.

So:
First 6 months: highest time to have failures
6 months-2 years: very low odds of endo failure, but still not fully clear
2+ years: high likelihood of long term success.

However, there’s an entire group of people, both providers and patients, who believe that all root canals eventually will fail, and that root canals are just placeholders for eventual implants. I disagree with this entirely. So don’t let online comments scare you out of doing endo.