Objectives: Patients with xerostomia manifest various clinical signs of oral dryness, which has an impact on oral functions and wearing of dental prosthese?s, but the evidence of xerostomia-related changes in denture performance is unsatisfactorily documented. The purpose of this systematic review was to evaluate whether the available literature can answer the focused question “Is there an association between xerostomia and decreased denture performance among patients wearing removable dentures?” Data sources: Indexed databases were explored without time or language restrictions up to and including March 2019. All levels of available evidence including experimental studies, case reports, and case series were searched using different combinations of the following keywords: saliva, xerostomia, dentures, personal satisfaction, quality of life, oral dryness, and oral complaints. Nine studies were included for qualitative synthesis. Overall, five studies had a cross-sectional design and four studies were case-control studies. In these studies, the number of participants ranged between 35 patients and 493 patients with mean ages ?from 56 to 82 years; 66% of the patients were completely and 34% were partially edentulous.
Conclusion: All studies included patient satisfaction with dentures and recorded the presence of oral dryness. Six out of nine studies demonstrated that xerostomia is significantly associated with the decreased performance of removable dentures. Although the available evidence lacks feedback from randomized, controlled clinical studies, it implies a negative impact of oral dryness on specific denture functions such as speaking, chewing, and retention, which affects both complete and partial denture wearers.
Keywords: performance, removable dentures, saliva, satisfaction, xerostomia
