Oxygenation of Prefrontal Cortex in Bruxism During Cognitive Tasks

• Published in: International dental journal Vol. 74; pp. S178 - S179
• Main Authors: Şentürk, Bilgin Ali, Karameşe, İsmail, Zengin, Nilüfer, Guducu, Cagdas
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier Inc 01.10.2024
• ISSN: 0020-6539
• DOI: 10.1016/j.identj.2024.07.1121

Mastication or chewing has been shown to enhance cognitive functions, including memory, attention and executive function by increasing the cerebral blood flow in the different brain regions (Kawakami et al., 2017). However, it remains unclear whether chewing gum does improve cognitive function in bruxism. In the present study, we aimed to investigate the relationship between gum chewing, brain oxygenation and working memory performance in the possible bruxism. We recruited eight subjects with possible bruxism (mean age 23.13 ± 5.11 years) and age-matched eight healthy volunteers (mean age 22.50 ± 2.77 years). Participants were asked to perform a gum chewing task for 15 minutes. The 2-back task was employed to assess working memory before and after gum chewing. We measured the changes in the prefrontal oxyhemoglobin (HbO) activity during the pre and post 2-back tasks by Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS). The results revealed that there was a significant main effect of the 2-back session on the prefrontal HbO activity (p = 0.022). The bruxism group showed lower HbO activity during the post 2-back session compared to pre 2-back session (p = 0.022), while no significant differences were observed between pre and post HbO activities in the healthy volunteers (p = 0.073). The present study revealed that chewing gum reduced oxygenation in the prefrontal cortex. This decrease was found to be deeper in bruxism. It is necessary to conduct additional research in which the sub-regions of the prefrontal cortex are investigated.