Saliva application in oral and systemic diseases

Abstract

Saliva is a noninvasive and accessible biofluid that permits early detection of oral and systemic diseases. Changes in saliva reflect the alterations in the blood and thus making saliva a suitable diagnostic tool. The use of saliva has many advantages, including simple and non-invasive sampling and easy, low-cost storage. Today salivary diagnostics is a promising tool for diagnostic processes and clinical monitoring. Saliva is used to detect illicit drugs, alcohol, to measure hormone levels, and in the diagnosis of wide range systemic diseases such as cardiovascular, infectious, renal, endocrine diseases, some types of cancer as well as nonsystemic oral diseases. The current review presents a critical overview of saliva as a promising tool for the development of valuable salivary biomarkers, their relevance to the prognosis, diagnosis and management of systemic and oral diseases. Development of point-of-care testing based on saliva samples as a screening tool will also support the diagnostic process in near future.