ASSESSMENT OF TWO TECHNIQUES FOR SAMPLING SALIVA IN INFANTS

Abstract: Introduction: Determining caries risk in infants when the mother has high cariogenic levels enables preventive action to be taken against the onset of caries at an early age. Taking saliva samples from infants is a labor-intensive step prior to proper diagnosis.Aim: The aim of this study is to compare two techniques for sampling saliva in infants to determine the microbiological risk of caries by semiquantitative counts.Material and methods: With prior approval from the Ethics Committee and informed consent, unstimulated saliva samples were taken from infants (n=19) aged 1 to 29 months, by means of two techniques. Spatula technique: saliva was collected by placing a wooden spatula in the infant's mouth for one minute, removing the spatula and seeding directly on culture medium. Pipette technique (Pasteur): A sterile pipette was used to aspirate 2.5 ml of saliva. The active part of the spatula was soaked in the saliva obtained using the pipette for one minute and then seeded directly on culture medium. Before pressing the spatula onto SB20M culture medium for caries risk (Saravia et al. 2010), it was bent at right angle using sterile cotton tweezers. Plates were incubated in candle jars for 72 h at 37 °C. Colonies (CFU) were counted and identified morphologically under a stereoscopic microscope (following Köller and Bratthall) by three trained observers (kappa=0.85), and confirmed by MALDI TOF.Results: An average 10.47 CFU were obtained with the spatula technique and 7.31 CFU with the pipette technique. Student’s t-test showed p = 0.64, therefore there is no significant difference between the spatula and pipette techniques. Conclusion: The spatula technique is recommended for semiquantitative counts for caries risk in infants because it is simpler and more comfortable for the child, and there is no difference in CFU recovery between spatula and pipette techniques.