Periodontal disease in homozygous HBSS adolescent Nigerians

The association between sickle cell anaemia (SCA) and periodontal disease was assessed in a prospective comparative study over 6 months using 50 adolescents known SCA patients and 50 adolescent non-SCA subjects. Their ages ranged from 11 to 19 years (mean = 15.25 years). The partial mouth recording system was used to determine the gingival index, plaque index, and probing depths of 6 sampled teeth in the mouth. There was no significant difference between the mean plaque and gingival indices of SCA and the control, but the mean probing depth of the SCA subjects was significantly higher than that of the control, notably amongst the females. However, this was of no clinical significance. The periodontal status of the males in the SCA group was similar to that of their female counterpart whereas the males in the control group have poorer status than the females in the same group. These results suggest that SCA does not lead to increased severity in periodontal disease in adolescent Nigerians.