Comparison of Saliva‐Check Mutans and Saliva‐Check IgA Mutans with the Cariogram for caries risk assessment

Abstract

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the combined use of two rapid, semiquantitative detection kits (Saliva-Check Mutans and Saliva-Check IgA Mutans) to assess caries risk using the Cariogram computer-based program as a reference method. Stimulated saliva samples were collected from 71 subjects, 20-73 yr of age, and the number of Streptococcus mutans per ml of saliva was measured using Saliva-Check Mutans. After 15 min, a red line in the test detection window indicated >5 × 10(5) colony-forming units (CFU) of S. mutans per ml of saliva. The concentration of salivary IgA in relation to the number of mutans streptococci was examined using the Saliva-Check IgA Mutans test kit. The presence or absence of a red line after 15 min indicated a high or a low concentration of IgA, respectively. By combining the results obtained from these two test systems, each patient was classified into one of four groups of low to high caries risk. Compared with the Cariogram data, the combined results of both detection kits showed that 39 (95%) of 41 subjects had a high chance of avoiding caries and 20 (67%) of 30 subjects had a low chance. The data suggest that the combination of Saliva-Check Mutans and Saliva-Check IgA Mutans could be used for caries risk assessment.

Evaluation of Chair-Side Assays in High Microbiological Caries-Risk Subjects

“…Using commercial kits allows detecting the microbiological caries risk in the daily clinical practice in a practical and fast way, without the need of laboratory procedures (11).…”

“…Detection of S. mutans in dental biofilm and saliva has been used as a manner to predict microbiological caries risk and monitor caries activity (6). The prevalence of S. mutans has been traditionally determined by microbial culture-based techniques (7-10), but there are also commercially available chair-side assay kits for this purpose (5,11).…”

“…A positive result of the antigen-antibody reaction means that the subject has S. mutans levels equal to or above 500,000 colony forming units (CFU) per mL of saliva (12), which indicates risk for caries disease. With sensitivity and specificity above 90%, Saliva-Check Mutans has been considered as a promising tool for caries risk assessment in the community and clinical settings (5) and its efficacy either alone or combined with other chair-side assays has been demonstrated (5,11,13,14). Except from a recent study (11) that evaluated the combined use of Saliva-Check Mutans and Saliva-Check IgA Mutans to assess caries risk in comparison with Cariogram computer-based program, there are no published studies evaluating Saliva-Check Mutans in its latest version, in comparison with traditional culture techniques.…”

“…An advantage of using commercial kits for assessing microbiological caries risk is that these assays produce results shortly after the collection of saliva samples. In addition, the kits are easy to use in the daily clinical practice, without the need of laboratory procedures (11). Commercial chair-side assays can also be used to obtain information in community caries prevention/control studies.…”

Evaluation of Efficacy of Three Different Commercially Available Kit for Chairside Cariogenic Bacteria Test – Caries Risk Test, Saliva-check Mutans and CariScreen

“…Bacteria play a crucial role in the formation and prognosis of dental caries. Among the clinical risk factors, mutans streptococci play an important role [1]. Various studies suggest an inverse relationship between the prevalence of non-mutans streptococci and the mutans streptococci, and is also correlated with caries development [2].…”