Heavy metals and pain in the dysfunctional patient

• Published in: Annali di stomatologia Vol. 5; no. 2; pp. 41 - 51
• Main Authors: Di Paolo, Carlo, Serritella, Emanuela, Panti, Fabrizio, Falisi, Giovanni, Manna, Fedele
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Italy CIC Edizioni Internazionali 01.04.2014; CIC Edizioni Internationali
• Subjects: Free radicals; Heavy metals; Metals; Organisms; Original; Origins; Oxidative stress; Pain; Pathology; Patients; Prostheses; Spectrometry; Spots; Studies; Urine; heavy metals; pain; TMD
• ISSN: 1824-0852; 1971-1441; 1971-1441
• DOI: 10.11138/ads/2014.5.2.041

The aim of this research is to verify the quality and quantity of heavy metals (HM) of dental origin in TMD patients. A population of 100 subject was studied and divided in two homogeneous groups: Study Group (SG) and Control Group (CG). Organism heavy metals were tested by a spot sampling method in which the first urine of the day, through Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS), were analyzed. The results obtained were compared with reference values (RV) of Italian people. Descriptive statistical analysis and student's t-test has been applied (statistical significance for p > 0.05). The SG presented the absolute highest levels of HM compared to the CG (p=0.787). As regards the relation between pain and HM, the subjects that refer "severe/very severe" values of pain present the highest levels of HM in urines. The obtained results seem to highlight a possible direct proportionality between the level of pain the increase of the concentration of heavy metals in all the examined groups and subgroups.