Ligature-induced periodontitis associated to alcohol using and stress on animal's behavior: study in rats

ABSTRACT

Introduction and Objective: To evaluate the effect of ligature-induced periodontitis association with chronic use of alcohol and stress on the behavior of the animals. Material and methods: Forty female rats were distributed equally into the following groups: control (CG), alcohol+stress+ligature (ASLG), stress+ligature (SLG), alcohol+ligature (ALG), ligature (LG). In the first day, the animals of ALG and ASLG were exposed to the ingestion of water and 20% alcohol solution (v/v). The animals of ASLG and SLG underwent stress testing through physical restraint for 4 daily hours, during 60 days until their euthanasia. In the next day after the beginning of the research, the animals of ALG, ASLG, SLG and LG were submitted to ligature installation around the right maxillary second molar. The evaluation of the behavior of the animals was executed through open field variables (amount of central and peripheral segments flown, times in which the animal was kept on two paws without support, self-cleaning movement - itchy nose) and maze cross parameters (amount of entrances in the arms and time of permanence in these sites). Data were gathered, their means calculated and submitted to analysis of variance and Ducan, Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney tests (p < 0.05). Results: The results did not demonstrate statistical differences for the parameters analyzed, except from the closed filed, in which ASLG and SLG exhibited the longest time of permanence. Conclusion: Considering the methodology used, it was possible to observe that the alcohol associated with chronic stress and ligature-induced periodontitis demonstrated few alterations on the behavior of the animals.