Effect of chewing mastic gum and xylitol gum on remineralization

Objectives:The use of sugar-free chewing gums is reported as highly effective in preventing the development of dental caries . the purpose of this study was to compare the effect of natural mastic gum and a xylitol chewing gum on the rate of remineralization of artificial caries-like lesions in human enamel .

Methods: In this study , Artificial caries-like lesions were created in the buccal surface of extracted premolars . Then Axial sections were cut from each tooth to the thickness of approximately 100 microns .

15 adult subjects participated in the study. Lower removable appliances with rectangular boxes in the lingual surfaces were fabricated for them and each box contained one slab of enamel .The removable appliance were worn for two separate periods of three weeks . The subjects chewed five sticks of gum ( mastic gum and a xylitol chewing gum ) per day , each for 20 minutes and after a lag time of 1 week , another gum was used in the way . Then, The sections were examined by polarized light microscope and The difference between the surface of two areas were recorded. The data were analyzed by LSD and paired t-test.

Results: The comparison of the rate of remineralization of caries-like lesions before and after using chewing-gum demonstrated significant difference in each group but there was no statistically significant difference between the two groups with their Remineralization rate increment (p>0.05) . the percentage of decrement of demineralization area after using mastic gum and the xylitol chewing gum was 6.02% and 8.86% respectively .

Conclusions: Chewing both mastic gum and xylitol chewing-gums improved the remineralization of caries-like lesions but they didn't show any significant difference with each other .