Relationship between salivary levels of cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone levels in saliva and chronic periodontitis

Aim: The aim was to investigate the association between cortisol and dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) levels in patients with periodontitis and healthy controls. Materials and Methods: Cortisol and DHEA levels in saliva were determined in 20 subjects, with clinical examinations including oral hygiene index, sulcus bleeding index (Muhlemann and Son) and probing depth was also performed. Statistical Analysis: Data were analyzed with the help of SPSS software package (version 7.0), and the significance level was set at 95% confidence interval. Mann-Whitney test and t-test were used to see the correlation between the groups. Results: In cortisol and DHEA the mean and standard deviation of periodontitis group were (2.6 ± 0.37) and (66.7 ± 8.7) respectively. Conclusion: This shows there is an increase in the mean value of cortisol and DHEA in periodontitis than the control group. Salivary cortisol and DHEA level were found to be increased in concordance with disease severity. This was statistically significant with P < 0.001.