Journal of Dental Research, Vol 67, 855-860, Copyright © 1988 by International & American Associations for Dental Research Online Journals
A case-control study of plasma ascorbate and acute necrotizing ulcerative gingivitis
S. L. Melnick, J. O. Alvarez, J. M. Navia, R. B. Cogen and J. M. Roseman
Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, University of Alabama at Birmingham 35294.
Data from animal studies and from studies of patients with acute
necrotizing ulcerative gingivitis (ANUG) have provided suggestive evidence
for an association between ascorbate deficiency and disease risk. Further,
there is biological plausibility for such an association, due to the role
of ascorbate in collagen synthesis and leukocyte function. A case-control
study of plasma ascorbate and ANUG was performed on 60 patients with a
history of ANUG infection and 60 age-race-sex-matched controls. No cases
had had active lesions for at least two months prior to their vitamin assay
to avoid any potential reduction of dietary intake of ascorbic acid due to
the presence of painful mouth lesions. According to results obtained by use
of a modification of the 2,4-dinitrophenylhydrazine method for
determination of total plasma ascorbate, the mean and standard error of the
mean of plasma ascorbate for all ANUG cases was 0.07 +/- 0.006 mmol/L; the
mean for all controls was 0.10 +/- 0.006 mmol/L. Paired differences in
plasma ascorbic acid concentrations between cases and controls were
significantly different from zero (p less than 0.001). The unadjusted
relative risk (RR) of ANUG as obtained by conditional logistic regression
for subjects whose plasma ascorbic acid concentration was at or below the
median value for controls, relative to subjects with higher values, was 7.3
(90% confidence interval, 3.0 - 17.4; one-sided p value less than 0.001).
Patients with a history of ANUG ingested a daily average of 1.2 +/- 0.2
servings of dietary ascorbic acid, as compared with a daily average of 1.9
+/- 0.2 servings for healthy controls.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
