Sugar Alcohols, Caries Incidence, and Remineralization of Caries Lesions: A Literature Review

Figure 1

“How it all began”: a pioneering plaque assessment study carried out in 1970 (a). Effect of dietary carbohydrates and xylitol on the growth of dental plaque after consumption of the shown sweeteners for four days (while the subjects refrained from oral hygiene), mainly in coffee or tea, and in the form of hard candies [11]. The consumption level of each sweetener was about 20 g per day and per subject. The values shown are means ± S.D. of fresh weight of plaque collected from all available tooth surfaces. (b) Inverse relationship between plaque fresh weight and its protein content. Twelve test subjects used xylitol chewing gum five times a day over a period of one month. Plaque from all available surfaces was collected following a 2-day no-oral-hygiene period. Consumption level of xylitol per day and per subject was 6.7 g. Xylitol consumption was associated with reduced plaque mass while the protein content of plaque simultaneously rose from 1.1 ±0.2 mg to 1.4 ±0.2 mg per mL of plaque suspension (straight line). Protein and nitrogen analyses should not be claimed to accurately determine the amount of dental plaque in clinical studies involving sugar alcohols.