Figure 3.

Relationships between disease, salivary gland dysfunction, and composition of saliva. The present review focuses on disease-related salivary gland dysfunction leading to altered composition and function of saliva. The causes considered are systemic diseases and therapeutic interventions (e.g., anticholinergic medications) that can cause salivary gland disease and dysfunction (solid lines). Saliva contains biomarkers of other systemic diseases (e.g., diabetes or liver disease) and oral diseases (e.g., periodontitis), which can directly alter the composition of saliva without necessarily causing salivary gland disease or dysfunction (dashed lines).