Background: Ideally an irrigant should provide a mechanical flushing action, be microbiocidal and dissolve remnants of organic tissues without damaging the periradicular tissues if extruded into the periodontium. Hence; we planned the present study to compare the efficacy of different root canal irrigants. Materials & methods: The present study included evaluation of efficacy of different root canal irrigants. A total of 60 freshly extracted maxillary second premolars with single pulp canal were included in the present study.Biomechanical preparation of all the teeth specimens was done using rotary Protaper system. At every change of instrument, the canals were irrigated with 2 ml of 2.5% NaOCl solutions during procedure. After Instrumentation, three subgroups were made and each had twenty teeth each and different irrigation protocols were used in each group. Group A: The canals were irrigated using 3 ml of physiological saline only for 1 min, Group B: The canals were irrigated using 3 ml of 2.5% NaOCl, and Group C: The canals were irrigated with 2% chlorhexidine (CHX) gluconate. The desiccated specimens were mounted and studied under Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM). All the results were analyzed by SPSS software.  Results: Mean score observed in group A, B and C specimens were found to be 5, 4.5 and 4.9 respectively. We obtained significant results on comparing the efficacy of all the three irrigant solutions. Conclusion: Better understanding of the mechanism of action of different irrigating solutions is required while making a choice for appropriate irrigating solution.
Key words: Efficacy, Irrigation, Root canal