Acid-base cements mostly create microleakage at tooth-restoration interface, while 4-META/MMA-TBB resin cement can provide microleakage-free interface. Microleakage has influence on marginal seal and retention of fixed dental prostheses which might affect their survival and complication rates. This retrospective study was conducted to explore the effect of luting cements on 5 to 10 years’ survival rates of single crowns and their complications such as caries associated with restorations, pulp necrosis and detachment. Two types of applied cement, acid-base cement (zinc phosphate, zinc polycarboxylate or glass-ionomer) and resin cement (4-META/ MMA-TBB) were evaluated in this study. One hundred and fifty nine patients treated with at least 1 single crown were recruited for examination, given a total of 583 teeth were included in this study. All crowns were performed by post-graduate students of Prosthodontic Department, Faculty of Dentistry, Chulalongkorn University during the year 2005 and 2010. Survival condition was determined by the absence of extracted teeth or renewal prostheses, while evaluated complications were caries associated with crown, pulp necrosis or crown detachment. Data was analyzed using Kaplan-Meier method followed by log-rank test to evaluate the differences of survival and complication rates between types of cement at significant level of 0.05. It was found that 5- and 10-year survival rates of acid-base cement were 92.2 % and 67.0 %, while those of 4-META/MMA-TBB cement were 95.5 % and 87.1 % respectively. The complication rate of caries associated with crown, pulp necrosis and crown detachment of acid-base cement were 12.5 %, 7.3 % and 4.4 %, whereas those of 4-META/MMA-TBB cement were 1.4 %, 2.4 % and 0.0 % respectively. There
were significant differences in survival rate (p=.023), caries (p=.001) and detachment complications (p=.008) between cement types. In conclusion, crowns fixed with 4-META/MMA-TBB cement that can provide microleakage-free tooth-prosthesis interface have longer-term function and less complication.