Vol.100 No.2 contentsPRACTICA OTO-RHINO-LARYNGOLOGICA
Vol. 100 No. 2 February 2007
Treatment of Human Dry Mouth Using Various Medicines
Masanori Umemoto, Tomomi Nin, Shinya Miuchi,
Atsushi Negoro and Masafumi Sakagami
(Hyogo College of Medicine)
There is no effective therapy for dry mouth, although the number of patients with this condition has been increasing in recent years. In the past, Chinese medicine was commonly used in human dry mouth. Recent studies reported that cevimeline hydrochloride hydrate and nizatidine, histamine H2 receptor antagonists, enhanced salivary secretion. Therefore, this study was designed to evaluate whether Chinese medicine, cevimeline and nizatidine can enhance salivary secretion in patients with dry mouth.
Basal/stimulated salivary secretions and subjective symptoms were measured before and after the administration of Chinese medicine (9.0 g/day), cevimeline (90 mg/day) and nizatidine (300 mg/day) over 90 days period in 100 patients with dry mouth, 13 men and 87 women (mean age: 69.0), who consulted our clinic.
Both the basal and stimulated salivary secretions were significantly increased in both the cevimerine and nizatidine treated groups. However, the Chinese medicine group did not show salivary secretion. Both the basal and stimulated salivary secretions after administration of nizatidine for 90 days were significantly different from those in the cevimeline and Chinese medicine groups on paired t-test. In addition, over 70％ of dry mouth patients reported subjective improvement of oral dryness after administration of cevimeline and nizatidine. These findings suggest that cevimeline and nizatidine increased salivary secretion and nizatidine is most useful for the treatment of patients with dry mouth.
Key words:
dry mouth, Chinese medicine, cevimeline, nizatidine