There is an association between colonization by Candida spp. and Periodontal Disease - Results of a Systematic Review

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the level of available scientific evidence that associates Candida spp. with periodontitis. To do this, an electronic search was conducted in the main electronic databases (PubMed, Scopus, Web of Science, Gray literature) without restriction to the language or date of publication on case-control studies, systematic reviews and meta-analyzes that evaluated the association between the presence of Candida spp. in patients with periodontitis and healthy patients. The risk of bias in the studies was assessed using the Newcastle-Ottawa criterion for case-control studies and the data related to the statistical parameters of interest (eg odds ratio, confidence interval and p-value) were extracted from the studies. Results: 1553 articles were initially identified, but only 04 met the inclusion criteria and were included for analysis. The high risk of bias was considered only for one study. Among the selected studies, two demonstrated that patients with periodontitis present a higher concentration of Candida sp. in subgingival sites when compared to healthy patients. Conclusion: Based on the results, it was possible to establish the association between the presence of Candida spp. in subgingival sites with periodontitis. However, the number of studies on the subject is still small. Further case-control studies are recommended so that a better consensus can be defined.