Impacto do estresse em lesões periapicais inflamatórias em ratos Wistar: foco na reabsorção óssea

Abstract

The inflammatory periapical lesion corresponds to the pulp exposure and bacterial infection in the root canals, promoting chronic inflammation as a response and destruction of periapical tissues, such as bone resorption. Recent studies have shown that stress has a positive association with the worsening of periodontal disease, but studies correlating stress and the evolution of inflammatory periapical inflammatory lesion are absent in the literature. The present study aimed to evaluate the evolution of the induced periapical lesion and its bone loss in Wistar rats exposed to stress. Twenty-five animals were divided into two groups (case and control), where they underwent a surgical procedure in the first left lower molar tooth for the induction of inflammatory periapical lesion through exposure of the dental pulp, through retention of the contamination (bacterial infection) during a 56 days period. The animals of the case group were stressed daily by electrical stimuli (1.10 mA), whereas the animals in the control group were absent from the stressful stimuli (shocks). On day 55, all animals were subjected to the open field test, and the next day they were sacrificed. The jaws were removed and collected for histological and radiographic analysis. The animals in the group of patients present a higher level of stress and a greater number of inflammatory cells that cause greater weight loss when compared to the animals in the control group. There was also a difference between the histological and radiographic analyzes, revealing that the diagnosis and quantification through the histological analysis are much more relevant and reliable as compared to the radiographic analyzes. We conclude that stress favors a greater evolution of the inflammatory periapical lesion by triggering worsened levels in the periapical tissue destruction and its bone loss.