Effects of Different Eating Patterns on Dental Caries in the Rat

Abstract

Fewer smooth surface carious lesions developed in rats fed a high-sucrose diet (2000) administered by a feeding machine delivering 22 portions (‘meals’) per day when additional meals of cheese (‘snacks’) were consumed after 12 selected meals. Snacks of peanuts had less effect. Further meals of diet 2000 instead of cheese or peanuts increased caries in smooth surfaces and fissures. Streptococcus mutans, inoculated at the start of the experiment, was recovered at significantly lower levels in the animals receiving cheese than in the groups receiving additional diet 2000 or no additional snacks. Salivary gland weights of all three groups fed supplementary meals were raised, but pilocarpine-stimulated saliva flow rates were increased only in the cheese and peanut groups. The results with cheese confirm expectations based on earlier studies of plaque pH changes in human subjects but the lack of effect of peanuts requires further study.