| Summary: | Introduction: Chronic periodontitis is an oral disease and having multiple etiologies. The coinfection between herpesviruses and periodontopathic bacteria might play a crucial role in the increasing severity of the disease. The present study was conducted to find out any specific coinfection which is contributing in increase in the severity of the disease.
Materials and Methods: It was a prospective case–control study. A total of 300 cases with chronic periodontitis (100 each from mild, moderate, and severe chronic periodontitis) and 300 age- and sex-matched controls were included. After fulfilling the inclusion and exclusion criteria, a subgingival plaque specimen was collected and processed for detection of herpesviruses and periodontopathic microbiota.
Results: Herpesviruses were significantly associated with anaerobes and yeasts as compared to aerobes. In severe chronic periodontitis, association of anaerobes and herpesviruses was found to be statistically significant in the present study. All four studied herpesviruses have shown strong association with Porphyromonas gingivalis.
Conclusion: Coinfection helps in the increasing severity of chronic periodontitis when a particular combination of herpesviruses and periodontopathic microbiota is detected from the cases of chronic periodontitis. Herpes simplex virus-2 and P. gingivalis seem to play a crucial role in the increasing severity of chronic periodontitis as compared to other coinfection combinations in the studied populations.
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