Chronic sialadenitis (CS) is a nonneoplastic disease that causes salivary dysfunction, mostly occurring in the submandibular gland (SMG) and parotid gland (Abdulkareem et al., 2018;Delli et al., 2014).Clinically, CS is mostly caused by salivary flow obstruction owing to sialolithiasis, gland inflammation, duct stenosis, external duct compression, mucus plugs or thick saliva sludge (Delagnes et al., 2017). The histopathological features of CS include acinar atrophy, ductal dilatation, ductal epithelial proliferation and metaplasia, lymphoplasmacytic infiltration, progressive fibrosis and intraductal mucous deposit (Hong et al., 2017). As CS is a common disorder in oral and maxillofacial surgery, and its exact pathological mechanism is largely unclear, it should be further explored by researchers.'Oxidative stress' (OS) refers to an imbalance between oxidants and antioxidants in favour of oxidants, leading to disruption of redox signalling and control and/or molecular damage (Sies et al., 2017). This generally results in the production of excessive reactive species that can damage proteins, lipids, nucleic acids and other biological molecular species in cells, resulting in mitochondrial dysfunction and