Out of a total of 200 participants, 174 (87%) had S. mutans titers equivalent to score 1, 2, and 3. The highest number of individuals (80) had protein inhibitors score 2, followed by Score 1 (34) and score 3 (38). The proportion of individuals with S. mutans score of 0 was least (26). The prevalence of S. mutans was significantly higher in females (92%) than in males (82%). Table 1 Correlation between dental caries experience and salivary S. mutans scores Table 3 Correlation between dental caries experience and salivary scores of S. mutans in females The salivary levels of S. mutans of the adults were related to their DMFT/S scores. It was found that overall DMFT/S was lower when the levels of S. mutans was less and increased with the increase in bacterial titers.

From score 1 to 2, the increase in the dental caries was not so marked, whereas there was statistically significant increase of decayed teeth/surfaces as the titers increased to score 3. This correlation was statistically highly significant in males with figures as 8.73 decayed surfaces at score 2 rising to 17.38 at score 3. In males, the difference in the mean DMFT/S between scores 0 and 3 was found to be statistically significant at 5% level [Table 2]. In females also a similar increase was seen, except from score 1 to 2, where there was a marginal decrease of 1 DMFS. The mean of DMFT was higher among females (4.74) than in the males (3.85) in the present study. In females, the difference between the groups was found to be statistically not significant (P > 0.5) [Table 3]. Table 2 Correlation between dental caries experience and salivary scores of S.

mutans in males DISCUSSION Oral disease is a major public health problem due to the high prevalence in all regions of the world and the greatest impact on the socially marginalized populations. Therefore, the evaluation of caries risk is most important. It gives an opportunity to improve hygiene, diet, and implement preventive measures in an exposed population.[20] Some authors compared the results of Strip mutans method with that of conventional MSB plating method and reported a highly significant correlation between the two (contingency coefficient = 0.76).[19] They also compared the number of S. mutans colony forming units per ml of saliva (CFU/ml) obtained on two consecutive occasions by using strip mutans method and observed a contingency coefficient of 0.

80 Cilengitide thereby establishing reliability of the method.[19] In the present study the decayed component comprised 99.04% of DMFT. It may be of significance to know that in the DMFT/S components, the filled component was only 0.96% depicting a total neglect of dental restorative care which is in accordance with a study in Sweden.[17] On the other hand, this factor of untreated carious lesions is advantageous as it does not mask the cumulative effect of correlation of the S. mutans titers with the spread of dental caries.