Salivary alpha-amylase-biomarker for monitoring type II diabetes.

Background: Diabetes is one of the most important causes of mortality worldwide. People having diabetes are vulnerable to infectious diseases and have been clinically recognized; which may be because of their deregulated immune system. Hyperglycemia in diabetes is consequence of chronic resistance to insulin and relative insulin deficiency on target cells. Alpha-amylase, a salivary enzyme is shown to increase in diabetic individuals compared to nondiabetics and can be used as a marker for the diagnosis of diabetes.

Aim And Objective: The present study was undertaken to investigate the levels of salivary amylase in type II diabetic patients.

Materials And Methods: A total of 80 participants in the age range of 30-60 years, were divided into three groups as Group I: Uncontrolled diabetics (30), Group II: Controlled diabetics (30) and Group III: Age- and sex-matched healthy controls (20) were taken for the study. Unstimulated whole saliva was collected for salivary amylase level estimation and blood samples were from the antecubital vein, after 12 h of overnight fasting of each individual for the estimation of blood glucose levels.

Results: The mean random blood sugar and glycated hemoglobin A levels were found to be statistically significant among diabetics and healthy individuals. Salivary amylase levels were much higher in uncontrolled and controlled diabetics compared to healthy individuals showing a significant correlation ( = 0.001) between all groups. However, the salivary amylase levels nonsignificant ( = 0.060) between the controlled diabetics (Group II) and healthy individuals (Group III).

Conclusion: Our study confirms the considerable increase in salivary amylase levels in diabetes patients as compared to healthy individuals. Studies with a larger sample size comprising prediabetics, type I diabetics and type II diabetics in all age groups are required to validate these results. Further, if our results are established, salivary amylase can be used as biomarker for the diagnosis of diabetes and also monitoring it.