Dental Caries Prevalence among Diabetics Acrylic Partial Denture Wearer’s- A Review

Introduction: Dental caries is one of the most common oral health conditions affecting 60-90% of the population. The progression of dental caries results in tooth loss if not treated properly. Tooth loss will presumably cause functional impairment which might ultimately affect the quality of life. Removable partial denture is one of the most widely accepted means of tooth replacement. It had been noticed that removable partial dentures increased the likelihood of new or recurrent caries on remaining adjacent natural teeth. Diabetes mellitus is the most routinely encountered disease among various systemic diseases. Studies revealed that dental caries has been more prevalent and even severe in diabetic patients than nondiabetics. Aim: To assess the effect of Acrylic Removable Partial Dentures (RPD) and diabetes in prevalence of dental caries. Materials and Methods: This study was carried out in JSSDCH, JSSAHER, Mysuru, Karnataka in the year July 2017. The duration of conducting literature search was from July 2017 to Dec 2019. Individuals participating in the study should be partially edentulous and aged between 18-64 years either diabetic or nondiabetic. 69 articles were identified from searching electronic data base (Pubmed, Cochrane, Google scholar) and manual searching from July 2017 to December 2019. 19 articles were excluded following an initial screening. 50 articles were included for the further review. Scientific evidence supporting the hypothesis of the study 10 articles where five articles were review and five articles were original research. The main outcome of intervention involved both methodology and assessment tools applied by investigator to assess the effect of RPD and diabetes in terms of prevalence of dental caries. Results: Studies had shown that RPD wearers shows high caries prevalence as compared to nonwearers, Diabetic patients reported high caries prevalence compared to nondiabetic patients. This literature review states that RPD and Diabetes had an impact on prevalence of dental caries. Conclusion: The conclusion from this present review would indicates that good metabolic control in diabetic patients, periodic monitoring of the removable partial denture, oral hygiene, good RPD design framework, following post-insertion instruction of the RPD, following regular recall visits contributes towards prevention of plaque favouring inhibition of caries prevalence among diabetic and nondiabetic patients wearing RPD