Dental evaluation is helpful in the differentiation of functional heartburn and gastroesophageal reflux disease.

Background: Heartburn is identically the key symptom of both, gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) and functional heartburn (FHB), making the differential diagnosis resource-intensive. Oral manifestations of GERD can be easily examined; therefore, their exploration might be a cheap, widely available, and useful tool in the differentiation of GERD and FHB.

Aim: To evaluate the prevalence of dental erosions (DE) and periodontal diseases (PD) in patients with heartburn and their association with GERD and FHB.

Methods: A total of 116 [M/F: 51/65, mean age: 54 (17-80) years] consecutive patients with heartburn were enrolled for detailed esophageal function and orodental examinations.

Results: Dental disorders were detected in 89% (103/116). Patients with PD + DE had significantly more often pathologic reflux (90.0% 27.8%; < 0.05), higher esophagitis scores (1.8 0.9; < 0.05), and a significantly different mean impedance curve ( = 0.04) than those without any dental diseases. The opposite approach established that patients with GERD had significantly higher prevalence of DE and PD, especially if both were present (28.9% 2.0%; < 0.01), more severe PD (1.5 1.0; < 0.01), and longer history of heartburn (15 years 9 years; < 0.01) than those with FHB.

Conclusion: The dental evaluation of patients with heartburn seems to be useful in the differential diagnosis of GERD and FHB. Among the studied parameters, the co-appearance of DE and PD seems to be the best predictor of GERD, whereas the absence of dental disorders was mostly observed in FHB.