Evaluation of the relation between salivary alpha-amylase level and oral diseases with the stress etiology: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Abstract

Abstract Stress is one of the etiologic factors causing oral diseases. There are different factors for measuring stress: Cortisol and Alpha-Amylase. Thus, this literature aims to evaluate the relationship between salivary alpha-amylase levels and oral diseases with the stress etiology. A systematic search of all articles without time limitation was carried out by relevant keywords from PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, and Scopus based on PRISMA instruction. Egger and Begg's regression did a statistical analysis of an asymmetric Funnel Plot for an adjusted rank correlation test. Sensitivity analysis was conducted to determine each study's effect on the final effect size. The number of articles after inclusion and exclusion criteria and checklist reached 10. The final effect size in 8 studies was 0.63(-0.08_1.34) alpha-amylase, which means the level of alpha-amylase in the case group was higher than the control group by about 0.63.It isn't significant(I2 = 93.3%,P = 0.000).The final effect size of Burning Mouth Syndrome( BMS) studies was 0.77(0.04_1.50), which means the level of alpha-amylase in the BMS group was higher than the control group by about 0.77.It is significant(I2 = 82.1%,P = 0.004). The final effect size in 6 studies was 0.61(-0.02_1.20) stress, which means the stress level in the case group was higher than in the control group, about 0.61. It is significant (I2 = 88.2%, P = 0.000) Although there are few studies about the relation between salivary alpha-amylase levels and oral diseases with stress etiology, it is recommended to conduct more clinical studies to achieve more accurate results and the relation between this factor and systemic diseases.