Tooth movement during orthodontic treatment

Prostaglandin effect on tooth movement Prostaglandins (PGs) are inflammatory mediator and a paracrine hormone that acts on nearby cells; it stimulates bone resorption by increasing directly the number of osteoclasts. In vivo and in vitro experiments were conducted to show clearly the relation between PGs, applied forces, and the acceleration of tooth movement. Yamasaki [10,11] was among the first to investigate the effect of local administration of prostaglandin on rats and monkeys. In addition, experiments done in [7] have shown that injections of exogenous PGE2 over an extended period of time caused acceleration of tooth movements in rats. Furthermore, the acceleration rate was not affected by single or multiple injections or between different concentrations of the injected PGE2. However, root resorption was very clearly related to the different concentrations and number of injections given. It has also been shown that the administration of PGE2 in the presence of calcium stabilizes root resorption while accelerating tooth movement [13]. Furthermore, chemically produced PGE2 has been studied in human trials with split-mouth experiments in the first premolar extraction cases. In these experiments the rate of distal retraction of canines was 1.6-fold faster than the control side [12].

Effect of Vitamin D3 on tooth movement Vitamin D3 has also attracted the attention of some scientist to its role in the acceleration of tooth movement; 1,25 dihydroxycholecalciferol is a hormonal form of vitamin D and plays an important role in calcium homeostasis with calcitonin and parathyroid hormone (PTH). Another set of investigators [16] has made an experiment where they have injected vitamin D metabolite on the PDL of cats for several weeks; it was found that vitamin D had accelerated tooth movement at 60% more than the control group due to the increasement of osteoclasts on the pressure site as detected histologically. A comparison between local injection of vitamin D and PGEs on two different groups of rats was also investigated. It was found that there is no significant difference in acceleration between the two groups.