Oral complications in bone marrow transplantation patients: recent advances

This paper presents some of the oral aspects encountered in bone marrow transplant (BMT) patients, as reflected in recent research conducted in the Department of Oral Medicine. Oral infections caused by Enterobacteriaceae were found to be responsible for a large proportion of positive cultures, during different stages of the transplantation process. Mucositis was constantly detected concomitant with the infections. It correlated with granulocytopenia and fever. The mucositis improved together with the immune system reconstitution. Immunoglobulins in saliva of BMT patients showed a drastic reduction following the patients' conditioning protocol and a return to normal levels soon after the transplantation. IgA, IgM and IgG were studied. Saliva was also shown to play an important role in the fibrinolytic system, through its plasminogen activator inhibitory contents. It seems that the active molecules are contained in the oral epithelial cells.