[Preventive and therapeutic advantages of sugar-free chewing gums in orthodontics. A study conducted on practitioners and patients].

Objective: The objective of this study is to assess the level of knowledge in a cohort of oral health professionals and patients about preventive and therapeutic actions of sugar-free chewing gums.
Materials and Methods: A forward-looking monocentric study of perception regarding the level of information about the effects of sugar-free chewing gums consumption was conducted on 135 young patients, from 11 to 17 years old, carriers of fixed orthodontic appliances and treated in the Department of Orthodontics in the Oral Medicine and Surgery Center of the University Hospitals of Strasbourg. Besides, 34 practitioners in the Department of Orthodontics and Pediatric Dentistry were also included. Data were collected between May 2016 and July 2016. A specific questionnaire, using the adapted terminology and dealing with the same items was developed for each studied population.
Results: The majority of the individuals of both studied populations believe that the consumption of sugar-free chewing gum leads to a greater risk of orthodontic device unsticking or fracture and that it is not associated to a decrease of the orthodontic pain.
Discussion: Our results confirm the fact that the knowledge, mainly acquired in an empirical way, is against the data of the current literature. The evaluation of the level of knowledge demonstrated that there is a real lack of information about the preventive interests of the consumption of sugar-free chewing gums during orthodontic treatment.
Conclusions: This study highlights the need for information campaigns and oral prevention in general population, as well as in healthcare professionals, concerning the preventive and analgesic interests of sugar-free chewing gums during orthodontic treatments.
(© EDP Sciences, SFODF, 2017.)