Root surface and coronal caries in adults with type 2 diabetes mellitus

A selection of abstracts of clinically relevant papers from other journals. The abstracts on this page have been chosen and edited by Dr Trevor Watts.

Abstract

Type 2 diabetes was a significant risk factor for root caries in this population.

Main

Hintao J, Teanpaisan R et al. Community Dent Oral Epidemiol 2007; 35: 302–309

Different investigators have reported various results for the relationship between diabetes and caries. This study in a Thai hospital compared 105 type 2 diabetic patients, and 103 non-diabetic controls attending for health check-ups.

Diabetic subjects had significantly more missing teeth than controls (10 v. 8), exposed root surfaces (26 v. 19) and root caries (prevalence 40% v. 18.5%). For coronal caries in the total 208 subjects, there were significant, though small, odds ratios for smoking history, dentures, Lactobacillus counts, age, missing teeth and salivary buffer capacity. For root surface caries there were significant ORs with type 2 diabetes (2.1), missing teeth, salivary buffer capacity and presence of coronal caries.