Drug-Induced Dental Caries: A Disproportionality Analysis Using Data from VigiBase.

Dental caries is defined as a pathological breakdown of the tooth. It is an infectious phenomenon involving a multifactorial aetiology. The impact of drugs on cariogenic risk has been poorly investigated.

In this study, we identified drugs suspected to induce dental caries as adverse drug reactions (ADRs) and then studied a possible pathogenic mechanism for each drug that had a statistically significant disproportionality.

We extracted individual case safety reports of dental caries associated with drugs from VigiBase® (the World Health Organization global individual case safety report database). We calculated disproportionality for each drug with a reporting odds ratio (ROR) and 99% confidence interval. We analysed the pharmacodynamics of each drug that had a statistically significant disproportionality.

In VigiBase®, 5229 safety reports for dental caries concerning 733 drugs were identified. Among these drugs, 88 had a significant ROR, and for 65 of them (73.9%), no information about dental caries was found in the summaries of the product characteristics, the Micromedex® DRUGDEX, or the Martindale databases. Regarding the pharmacological classes of drugs involved in dental caries, we identified bisphosphonates, atropinic drugs, antidepressants, corticoids, immunomodulating drugs, antipsychotics, antiepileptics, opioids and β2-adrenoreceptor agonist drugs. Regarding possible pathogenic mechanisms for these drugs, we identified changes in salivary flow/composition for 54 drugs (61.4%), bone metabolism changes for 31 drugs (35.2%), hyperglycaemia for 32 drugs (36.4%) and/or immunosuppression for 23 drugs (26.1%). For nine drugs (10.2%), the mechanism was unclear.

We identified 88 drugs with a significant positive disproportionality for dental caries. Special attention has to be paid to bisphosphonates, atropinic drugs, immunosuppressants and drugs causing hyperglycaemia.