Abstract
Many elderly patients have oral dryness; thus, it is necessary to evaluate the oral moisture in a clinical setting. The aim of this study was to clarify the importance of controlling the measuring pressure of the oral moisture-checking device. The influence of the measuring pressure of the oral moisture-checking device was examined using agar under 10 measuring pressure conditions (Kruskal–Wallis test). Fifty-five oral dryness patients were examined the lingual moisture using the device with and without a tongue depressor. The tongue depressor was placed underneath the tongue to support it during the measurement. The mean value and the coefficient of variation of five measurements was evaluated (paired t-test or Wilcoxon signed-ranks test). The agar moisture values changed according to the measuring pressure (p < 0.05). The lingual moisture value with the tongue depressor was higher than that without the tongue depressor (p < 0.05). The coefficient of variation with the tongue depressor was smaller than that without the tongue depressor (p < 0.01). The results of this study indicated that the measuring pressure of oral moisture-checking device influenced the measurement value, and it is necessary to support the tongue for the measurement of lingual mucosal moisture in a uniform manner.
Highlights
A decrease in the amount of salivary secretion results in xerostomia [1], termed oral dryness.This in turn can lead to other symptoms associated with the oral cavity and pharynx [2,3,4,5,6,7,8]
A previous study showed that stimulated saliva and oral moisture at the lingual mucosa were associated with subjective oral dryness, but no relationship between oral moisture at the buccal mucosa and subjective oral dryness was found [13]
The oralthe moisture-checking device used in this study wasoral modified from a skin moisture-checking investigated influence of measuring pressure of the moisture-checking device on the device to measure moisture aofuniform the epithelium at a depth of several of micrometers within the measurement valuethe to establish measurement manner for thetens evaluation of oral dryness
Summary
A decrease in the amount of salivary secretion results in xerostomia [1], termed oral dryness This in turn can lead to other symptoms associated with the oral cavity and pharynx [2,3,4,5,6,7,8]. The oral moisture-checking device Mucus® (Life Co., Saitama, Japan) measures oral mucosal moisture within two seconds [11]. This device is the first device to measure the oral moisture, and was recently used to evaluate oral dryness among elderly populations residing in nursing homes, patients in the intensive care unit, and patients who have suffered strokes because the results are not influenced by oral function or overall condition [12]. Measurement of the oral moisture at the lingual mucosa was considered to be Geriatrics 2020, 5, 28; doi:10.3390/geriatrics5020028 www.mdpi.com/journal/geriatrics
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