Abstract
Adolescence is closely associated with a high risk of caries. The identification of specific bacteria in an oral microniche, the interdental space of the molars, according to carious risk can facilitate the prediction of future caries and the anticipation of the progression or stabilization of caries in adolescents. A cross-sectional clinical study according to the bacteriological criteria of interdental healthy adolescents and carious risk factors—low and high—using a real-time polymerase chain reaction technique was conducted. The presence of 26 oral pathogens from the interdental microbiota of 50 adolescents aged 15 to 17 years were qualitatively and quantitatively analyzed. Bacteria known to be cariogenic (Bifidobacterium dentium, Lactobacillus spp., Rothia dentocariosa, Streptococcus cristatus, Streptococcus mutans, Streptococcus salivarius, Streptococcus sobrinus, and Streptococcus wiggsiae) did not present differences in abundance according to carious risk. Periodontal bacteria from the red complex are positively correlated with carious risk. However, only 3 bacteria—S. sobrinus, E corrodens and T. forsythia—presented a significant increase in the highest group. Estimating the risk of caries associated with bacterial factors in interdental sites of molars in adolescents contributes to the better definition of carious risk status, periodicity and intensity of diagnostic, prevention and restorative services.
Highlights
In 2017, the three most common causes of the global burden of diseases in the world were oral disorders (3.47 billion, 95% UI 3.27–3.68), headache disorders (3.07 billion, 95% UI 2.90–3.27), and tuberculosis, including latent tuberculosis infection (1.93 billion, 95% UI 1.71–2.20) [1]
The low caries risk (LCR) group was composed of 18 females and 7 males, whereas the high caries risk (HCR) group was composed of 15 females and 10 males
Contrary to the study of Gross and colleagues that demonstrated that C. rectus decreased as caries progressed, our study revealed no modification according to caries risk that could be explained because those authors sampled supragingival biofilm from carious lesions, whereas we analyzed interdental biofilms associated with a healthy surface [56]
Summary
In 2017, the three most common causes of the global burden of diseases in the world were oral disorders (3.47 billion, 95% UI 3.27–3.68), headache disorders (3.07 billion, 95% UI 2.90–3.27), and tuberculosis, including latent tuberculosis infection (1.93 billion, 95% UI 1.71–2.20) [1]. The same year, the prevalence of caries on permanent teeth was 23,019,992,000 [1]. Dental caries associated with periodontal disease are, together, the most prevalent microbe-mediated human disease worldwide [2]. Dental caries is a biofilm-mediated, sugar-driven, multifactorial, dynamic disease that results in the phasic demineralization and remineralization of dental tissues [3]. Dental caries is the result of dissolution of the tooth mineral by a reduction in pH due to the sustained fermentation of carbohydrate by bacteria in a local biofilm structure that limits the ability of saliva to wash away or buffer the acidic metabolic products [4,5,6]. Caries are associated with dysbiosis of the tooth-colonizing microbiota, characterized by the accumulation of aciduric and acidophilic bacteria [8]. The balance between pathological and protective factors influences the initiation and progression of caries [3]
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