Detection and prevalence of periodontal pathogens in a Uruguayan population with chronic periodontitis using conventional methodology and metagenomics.

Abstract

 Periodontal diseases are a major problem in human health. Decades of research have shown that the most common disease is chronic periodontitis, cha-racterized by a slow evolution with the formation of periodontal pockets, subsequent alveolar bone resorption, loss and destruction of teeth and bone tissue. While we know the multifactorial origin of the development of periodontitis, the participation of subgingival microbiota is relevant in the etiology of periodontal disease. Some pathogenic bacteria species that have been associated with the develo-pment of periodontal disease are Aggregatibacter actinomycetemcomitans, Porphyromonas gingivalis, Prevotella intermedia, Tannerella forsythia, Fusobac-terium nucleatum, among others. In this work we studied which of these five species were present in the periodontal pockets of 51 Uruguayan patients with chronic periodontitis. To achieve the results a conventional microbiological technique and meta-genomics (multiplex-PCR) were used. The results of the microbiological conventional technique showed the presence of A. actinomycete-mcomitans (33%) and black pigmented anaerobic bacteria (100%) in the samples. From the results obtained in the multiplex-PCR we saw that the most prevalent species were F. nucleatum (100%), T. forsythia (92%) and P. gingivalis (88%). In con-trast, lower prevalence species were P. intermedia (39%) and A. actinomycetecomitans (33%).