Assessment of salivary opiorphin in oral lichen planus

Abstract

Opiorphin is a pentapeptide, which could be isolated from human fluids and has a decreasing effect on pain. Aim: Since lichen planus is a chronic mucocutaneous disease, which causes pain or burning feeling in the oral mucosa, this study aimed to compare salivary opiorphin levels of oral lichen planus (OLP) patients with healthy subjects. Methods: This case-control study, was performed on 24 patients with OLP lesions and 21 healthy subjects. After collecting unstimulated saliva, opiorphin levels were compared between two groups through statistical analyses. Results: There was not any significant difference between OLP patients and healthy subjects according to salivary opiorphin concentration (p=0.378). Also, in the OLP group, opiorphin concentration was not significantly different between males and females (p=0.601). Analytical analysis could not show any remarkable difference between various severity of OLP lesions regarding to salivary opiorphin levels (p=0.653). Conclusion: In this study, salivary opiorphin levels was not significantly different between patients with OLP and healthy subjects; however, more studies are suggested for better assessment of salivary opiorphin levels in various types of OLP lesions and its correlation with pain severity.

Salivary opiorphin levels in denture‐related traumatic ulcers

“…Some studies report a correlation between opiorphin levels and age (Nejad et al, 2020; Paszynska et al, 2022) or gender (Dufour et al, 2013). However, most studies did not indicate correlation between opiorphin levels and age and gender (Boucher et al, 2017; Dalirsani et al, 2023; Ozdogan et al, 2019, 2020; Salarić et al, 2017). In accordance with the majority of the studies, no significant correlation was observed between opiorphin levels and age and gender in the present study.…”

“…Existing evidence strongly suggests that secretion of opiorphin in biological fluids increases as a response to painful stimuli, likely as a defense mechanism to increase the potency of innate anti‐nociceptive mechanisms. While some of these studies report a correlation between the opiorphin levels and the severity of the pain (Al‐Saffar et al, 2013; Ozdogan et al, 2019; Parida et al, 2018), majority of the studies report no correlation (Boucher et al, 2017; Dalirsani et al, 2023; Nejad et al, 2020; Ozdogan et al, 2020; Salarić et al, 2017). In our study, no significant correlation between the VAS scores and opiorphin levels was observed as well.…”

“…The role and regulation of salivary opiorphin in certain conditions that may cause orofacial pain, such as burning mouth syndrome, pulpitis, and oral cancers has been investigated (Boucher et al, 2017; Dalirsani et al, 2023; Nejad et al, 2020; Ozdogan et al, 2019; Salarić et al, 2017). However, salivary opiorphin levels in trauma‐related orofacial pain has not yet been investigated.…”