Archs oral Bid. Vol. 35, Suppl., pp. 21 IS-212S, 1990 0003-9969/90 $3.00 + 0.00 Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved Copyright 0 1990 Pergamon Press plc A STUDY OF THE POSSIBLE CORRELATION OF HIGH SALIVARY CALCIUM LEVELS WITH PERIODONTAL AND DENTAL CONDITIONS IN YOUNG ADULTS L. SEW&N* and M. MAKELA Institute of Dentistry, University of Turku, SF-20520 Turku, Finland Summary-The periodontal bone level and the number of erupted and intact teeth were assessed from the X-rays of 46 dental students (mean age 24.2 yr). Paraffin-stimulated whole saliva was collected in a standarized way and the salivary flow-rate was measured. The salivary concentration of calcium was analysed by atomic absorption spectrophotometry. The subjects were divided into 2 groups according to the salivary Ca level. Subjects with salivary Ca levels over the mean value (51.03 pg/ml) were included in the ‘high salivary Ca group’ (n = 20). Age- and sex-matched pairs showing Ca levels below the mean formed the ‘low salivary Ca group’ (n = 26). The results show that subjects in the high salivary Ca-group had significantly more intact teeth than their pairs in the low salivary Ca group (p < 0.025). There was no difference in the total number of teeth present nor in the salivary flow rate. No periodontal breakdown could be detected in any of the X-rays. It seems that in young adults high salivary Ca content can & correlated with good dental health but not with periodontal bone destruction. Key words: salivary calcium levels, intact teeth, periodontitis. INTRODUCTION Recently our research group has published a cross- sectional epidemiological study in Finland, the find- ings of which suggest an inverse relationship between periodontitis and caries (Sewon et al., 1988) in the population aged 3&59 yr. We explained this as being due to the different mineralization patterns of plaque in different oral environments. Several epidemiologi- cal studies have previously shown an inverse relation- ship between dental calculus and caries (James, 1965; Sutcliffe, 1965; Marthalerand Schroeder, 1966) but be- tween periodontitis and caries it is a novel finding in a populationwherebotharefrequent(Sewonefal., 1988). Mandel (1974a, b) found that heavy calculus pro- ducers had higher Ca concentrations, both in dental plaque and in submaxillary saliva, than light calculus producers. We made similar findings in subjects with and without periodontitis (Sewon, Sijderling and Karjalainen, 1989, 1990). This suggests that a person with high Ca content of plaque and saliva may be susceptible both to calculus formation and periodon- titis. Our findings further suggested a positive corre- lation between high salivary Ca content and high plaque Ca content as well as a high number of intact teeth. We have now examined the hypothesis that young adults with high salivary Ca content susceptible to high plaque mineralization levels may show peri- odontitis and may have more intact teeth than those with lower salivary Ca contents. MATERIAL zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA AND METHODS Altogether 65 dental students (all Finnish, 23 men and 42 women, mean age 23.7 yr) were examined at *To whom correspondence should be addressed. Abbreuiarion: DMF, decayed missing filled. the Institute of Dentistry in Turku. The periodontal bone level was estimated, and the total number of erupted teeth (wisdom teeth excluded) and intact teeth (no past caries experience) was counted from X-rays. Five milhlitres of paraffin-stimulated whole saliva were collected on ice in a standardized way (always in the morning at least l/2 an hour after the last meal) and the collection time was recorded for calculating the salivary flow-rate. Two subsamples of 100 ~1 of whole saliva were taken for analysis of calcium by atomic absorption spectrophotometry. Those who had earlier received systemic fluoride and tooth protection by sealants (n = 18; 5 men and 13 women) were excluded. The remaining number of subjects was 46, 18 men and 28 women. The subjects were divided into two groups according to their salivary Ca level. All subjects (n = 20; 12 men and 8 women) showing salivary Ca levels over the mean value (51.03 pg/ml) were included in the ‘high sali- vary Ca group’ while age- and sex-matched pairs showing Ca levels below the mean formed the ‘low salivary Ca group’ (n = 26, 6 men and 20 women). The groups were then compared with respect to the number of intact teeth, the total number of teeth present and the salivary flow-rate. Wilcoxon’s test for paired differences was used for statistical analysis, and Student’s r-test where appropriate. RESULTS The subjects with a salivary Ca content over the mean value (51.03 pg/ml) had significantly more intact teeth (p < 0.025) than their age- and sex- matched controls (Table 1). There was no difference between the groups in the total number of teeth present nor in the salivary flow-rate. Periodontitis was not found among the subjects. Within the whole study group there were only 6 211s