Assessment of serum and salivary oxidative stress biomarkers with evaluation of oral health status in a sample of autistic male children

Abstract EN

Background : Autism is a severe neurodevelopmental disorder, presents in early childhood, characterized by severe impairments in socialization, communication and behavior.

Autism is considered a multi-factorial disorder that is influenced by genetic, environmental, and immunological factors with oxidative stress as a mechanism linking these factors.

Assessment of any oral manifestations; measurement of oxidative stress in saliva has to be discovered, evaluated and measured in autistics to be used as a potential diagnostic aid since saliva is an ultra-filtrate of serum and meet the demand for inexpensive, noninvasive and accessible diagnostic methodology.

Materials and methods : Oral health status : DMFT / dmft and gingival indices as well Serum and salivary Malondialdehyde (MDA) levels, glutathione (GSH), superoxide dismutase (SOD) and uric acid (UA) were estimated for 58 individuals aged (2-13) years, twenty nine of them were autistics and twenty nine were sex and age matched healthy controls.

Results : The results of this study showed that Iraqi autistic children sample was more likely to be caries-free, with significant abnormalities of the oxidative stress biomarkers.

Conclusion : Saliva can be used as adjunctive diagnostic aid for measurement of the oxidative stress in autism.

Serum GSH and uric acid then serum and salivary Malonyldialdehyde followed by salivary glutathione and serum superoxide dismutase are the most powerful predictors of autism spectrum disorder respectively.