Total antioxidant property and pH change of dental plaque and saliva in 6-11-year-old children after consumption of flavored milk

Introduction: The antioxidant properties of chocolate and other flavored additives besides the sugar added to milk raises the question about the acidogenecity of flavored milk. This study was conducted to measure the pH changes of dental plaque and saliva after the consumption of flavored milk and evaluate the antioxidant property of them. Methods: This study was performed on 42 samples of dental plaque and 42 samples of saliva in 6-11 year old school going children. Milk with flavors of strawberry, chocolate, banana, honey and slim milk were evaluated, all from the same manufacturer with a similar production date. At the beginning of the study on the first day, children were given thorough oral propHylaxis and they were instructed to avoid any method of oral hygiene for 48 hours to permit enough plaque deposition. On the third day the children were divided into 7 groups, 6 children in each group. The supra-gingival plaque was collected through the help of an excavator #3 which was pulled twice with the same force on the tooth surface. The saliva was collected using spitting technique. Each child swished 10 cc of milk for 1 minute in his/her mouth. Fresh plaque samples after 5, 10, 20 and 30 minutes and saliva samples immediately, after 5, 10, 20 and 30 minutes were collected. The pH of the samples were recorded by a pH testing apparatus (Basic 20+, Crisom). To evaluate the antioxidant property of studied milk, Frap test was performed. The collected readings were reported as mean±SD and analyzed by ANOVA repeated measures, Post hoc Tukey and Paired T-test. In this study, p≤0.05 was considered as significant. Results: After 30 minutes, honey milk caused the least drop 0.74±0.30 and banana milk caused the highest drop 1.38 0.25 in plaque pH (p≤0.05). After 30 minutes, the pH of saliva showed no significant difference compared to the initial pH. Chocolate milk contained the highest (1000 micromol/liter) and banana milk the lowest (706.25 micromol/liter) antioxidant concentration. Conclusions: Because of the highest antioxidant properties and reduction of dental plaque PH to a lesser extent, milk with honey, chocolate and coffee is more recommended for children.