ABSTRACT
In December 2019, SARS-CoV-2 was detected, causing a considerable amount of people diseased. Around ten to twenty patients experienced post-COVID-19 symptoms that persevered, surpassing three weeks after the initial infection, which then was referred to as long-COVID. Long-COVID symptoms primarily are prolonged symptoms encountered in the acute phase, but there is a high potential of other unidentified long-COVID symptoms. To this point, clinical studies regarding the effects of COVID-19, particularly in regard to the long-term, are still scarce. This study is carried out to discover the long-term effects of COVID-19 on gingivitis and periodontitis. This study included 40 subjects, consisting of half of COVID-19 survivors (diagnosed by a history of at least one positive PCR result) and the rest were non-COVID-19 survivors, each group consisting of 10 gingivitis patients and 10 periodontitis patients. The COVID-19 group filled out a questionnaire to discern long COVID (at least one persisting symptom 4 weeks to 6 months after the initial infection). A complete periodontal examination (probing depth, bleeding on probing, simplified oral hygiene index, clinical attachment loss, and panoramic examination) was done on all participants, and data analysis was performed to discern gingivitis and periodontitis severity between each group. No significant difference was found in the distribution of gingivitis (localized/generalized) between COVID-19 survivors and non-survivors (p>0.05). There was also no significant difference in the distribution of periodontitis (localized/generalized) between COVID-19 survivors and non-survivors (p>0.05). Similarly, this study also showed that there were no differences in periodontitis staging and grading between COVID-19 survivors and non-survivors (p>0.05), as well as there was no significant difference between COVID-19 survivors and non-survivors’ periodontal clinical parameters. Accordingly, this pilot study has excluded long COVID impact on gingivitis and periodontitis severity measured by clinical parameters.
