Effectiveness of lip and cheek biting treatment in athletes

Relevance. Oral mucosal diseases are currently a significant problem since patients rarely notice the unusual appearance of the oral mucosa and, therefore, do not consult a dentist at the early stages of the disease.Purpose. To evaluate the effectiveness of treatment for biting lips and cheeks in athletes.Material and methods. The study included 170 people (20-40 years old) who underwent a dental examination according to the WHO recommendations, electromyography of the masticatory muscles, Doppler ultrasound and autofluorescence examination of the oral mucosa. Group 1 included athletes involved in sports for up to 1 year (35 people), Group 2 included people with sports experience of 1-5 years (43 people), and Group 3 - with sports experience of 5 to 10 years (42 people). The control group consisted of 50 generally healthy men who did not engage in sports. The patients diagnosed with biting their lips and cheeks (K13.1 according to ICD-10) received comprehensive treatment.Results. Dental examination revealed biting of lips and cheeks in 46.7% of the examined patients. The prevalence of biting lips and cheeks appeared to grow with increasing length of sports experience; it amounted to 5.7% in the group with sports experience of up to one year and 66.7% – in the group with experience of 5-10 years. The pretreatment examination detected that the blood flow velocity was 2.1 times lower in group 3 than in the control group. The amplitude of the masticatory and temporal muscles at rest was 1.7 times higher in patients of group 3 than in the control group, which indicates an increase in the tone of the masticatory muscles in athletes and a significant difference in the condition of the muscle tissue of the masticatory muscles in athletes.Conclusion. Athletes, based on the length of their sports-training experience, showed significant differences in dental status, electromyography indicators of the masticatory muscles and Doppler ultrasound of the oral mucosa. Our proposed method for treating cheek and lip biting has shown high effectiveness.