How sublingual buprenorphine may affect mouth and dental health
Official title: Understanding the Association between Sublingual Buprenorphine and Oral Health Outcomes
Funded at University of Kentucky · NIH-11354406 · Data updated 2026-11-12
This project will compare saliva, mouth bacteria, and dental health in adults with opioid use disorder who take sublingual buprenorphine to learn whether the medicine is linked to more oral disease.
Quick facts
| Grant type | R01 grant |
|---|---|
| Study type | NIH-funded research |
| Funding institution | University of Kentucky NIH-funded |
| Lab location | 1 site (Lexington, United States) |
| Project start | September 21, 2023 |
| Project end | August 31, 2028 |
| Funding year | 2025 |
| Award (this year) | $625,388 |
| NIH project number | 4R01DE033318-02 |
| Project ID | NIH-11354406 on NIH RePORTER |
Who could benefit from this research
✓Could help
Adults with opioid use disorder who are currently taking or starting sublingual buprenorphine and who can attend clinic visits are the best fit for this study.
✕Less likely to help
People not using sublingual buprenorphine, those on other forms of MOUD exclusively, or those unable to attend follow-up visits are unlikely to benefit directly from joining.
What this research studies
If you join, the team will follow your dental health over time with regular mouth exams and questionnaires about oral hygiene and behaviors. They will collect saliva and oral swabs to measure salivary flow, pH, and inflammatory markers and will use 16S rRNA sequencing to profile mouth bacteria. The study will compare people taking sublingual buprenorphine to control groups while accounting for smoking, diet, and other lifestyle factors. Results will show whether changes in saliva or the oral microbiome explain any increased dental disease.
Why it matters
Potential benefit: If successful, the work could identify preventable causes of dental problems in people using sublingual buprenorphine and guide steps (like extra dental care) to reduce harm.
How similar studies have gone: Previous evidence linking sublingual buprenorphine to oral disease comes mostly from case reports and adverse-event summaries, so longitudinal microbiome-focused work like this is relatively novel.
Where this research is happening
-
University of Kentucky
Lexington, United States Active
Researchers
- Principal investigator: Rojas Ramirez, Marcia Vanessa — University of Kentucky
- Study coordinator: Rojas Ramirez, Marcia Vanessa
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About this research
- This is an active NIH-funded research project — typically early-stage science, not a clinical trial accepting patient enrollment.
- Some NIH-funded labs run parallel clinical studies or seek volunteers for related work. To check, contact the principal investigator or institution listed above.
- For full project details, budget, and progress reports, visit the official NIH RePORTER page.