Assessment and correlation of blood glucose levels using gingival Crevicular blood, finger-capillary blood and venous blood samples in diabetic and non-diabetic patients

Introduction: Diabetes has a high prevalence rate in India. More than 62 million diabetic individuals were currently diagnosed with diabetes. Most often patients with diabetes go undiagnosed. This study was undertaken to screen patients for diabetes mellitus using gingival crevicular blood during dental procedures. Objective: Objectives are to assess and compare the glucose levels in the gingival crevicular blood, Finger capillary, and intravenous blood. Materials and Methods: The study involved 30 diabetics and 30 non-diabetic patients in the age group of 20 to 80 years of either sex with a positive sign of bleeding on probing. Glucometer has been used to measure blood glucose measurements from the samples of gingival crevicular blood (GCB) and finger prick(FP). Intravenous blood (IVB) was collected for glucose level measurement in a laboratory glucose analyzer. Results: Among diabetics, GCB and IVB show moderate positive correlation (0.71) and strong positive correlation between FP and IVB (0.93). Among Non-diabetics, moderate positive correlation observed between FP and IVB (0.67) and GCB and IVB(0.76). Conclusion: The data from this study shows that among diabetic patients FP can be taken as a strong tool for glucometric analysis. Whereas among non-diabetic patients GCB can be considered as good source of blood for glucometric analysis. In diabetics, GCB can be taken as a source for glucometric analysis but with caution as GCB and IVB showed moderate positive correlation.