Systemic effects of fl uoxetine on the amount of tooth movement, root resorption, and alveolar bone remodeling during orthodontic force application in rat

Background: Antidepressant drugs such as fl uoxetine are of the most commonly used drugs among the public. These drugs may impact the regulation of bone cell functioning, and thus affect orthodontic tooth movement. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of fl uoxetine on tooth movements during orthodontic treatment in rats. Materials and Methods: In this study, 30 male rats were randomly assigned into two groups and injected with fl uoxetine 10 mg/kg (experimental group) and normal saline (control group) for a period of 1-month intraperitoneally 5 times/week. Then, the rats were anesthetized and a nickeltitanium closed-coil spring was placed between the left maxillary fi rst molar and left maxillary central incisors of all samples, and then fl uoxetine (experimental group) and normal saline (control group) were injected for another 3 weeks by the same method. After measuring tooth movements, rats were sacrifi ced, and histomorphometric analyses were conducted and the obtained data were statistically analyzed using independent t-test and the signifi cance was set at 0.05. Results: Following the fl uoxetine injection, the mean amount of tooth movements in the experimental group was reduced compared to the control group, which was not statistically signifi cant (P = 0.14). There was no signifi cant difference between the two groups regarding bone apposition rate (P = 0.83), external root resorption rate (P = 0.1), and mean number of root resorption lacunae (P = 0.16). Conclusion: Within the limitations of this study, systemic use of fl uoxetine may cause insignifi cant reduction of tooth movement rate in rats; however, this subject needs more evaluations.