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Effects of herbal mouthwashes on plaque and inflammation control for patients with gingivitis: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials

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journal contribution
posted on 2024-10-22, 02:04 authored by He Cai, Junyu Chen, Nirmala Perera, Xing Liang

Objective. The aim of this study was to evaluate the overall effects of herbal mouthwashes as supplements to daily oral hygiene on plaque and inflammation control compared with placebos and chlorhexidine mouthwashes in the treatment of gingivitis. Methods. PubMed, EMBASE, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, and grey literature databases were searched. Only randomised controlled trials comparing herbal mouthwashes with placebos or chlorhexidine in the daily oral hygiene of patient with gingivitis were included to compare the effect of different mouthwashes on plaque and inflammation control. Results. A total of 13 studies satisfied the eligibility criteria, and 11 studies were included in meta-analyses. Significant differences were observed in favour of herbal mouthwashes compared with placebos in both plaque- and inflammation-related indices (Quigley-Hein Plaque Index, QHPI: WMD = -0.61, 95% CI (-0.80, -0.42), P<0.001; Gingival Index, GI: -0.28 (-0.51, -0.06), P=0.01; Modified Gingival Index, MGI: -0.59 (-1.08, -0.11), P=0.02; Gingival Bleeding Index, GBI: -0.06 (-0.09, -0.04), P<0.001). No significant difference was found between herbal and chlorhexidine mouthwashes. Conclusions. Herbal mouthwashes have potential benefits in plaque and inflammation control as supplements to the daily oral hygiene of patients with gingivitis. Although no difference was observed between herbal and CHX mouthwashes in the selected studies, further high-quality RCTs are needed for more firm support before advising patients with gingivitis about whether they can use herbal mouthwashes to substitute for CHX mouthwashes or not.

Funding

The authors would like to thank the China Scholarship Council for supporting He Cai and Junyu Chen and the Centre for Sport, Exercise and Osteoarthritis Research Versus Arthritis Postdoctoral Fellowship for supporting Nirmala K. Panagodage Perera. This work was supported by the Graduate Student's Research and Innovation Fund of Sichuan University (grant no. 2018YJSY108); the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation Funded Project (grant no. 2018M640931); the Science & Technology Key Research and Development Program of Sichuan Province (grant no. 2019YFS0142); and the Young Scientists Fund of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 81901060).

History

Publication Date

2020-01-20

Journal

Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Volume

2020

Article Number

2829854

Pagination

16p.

Publisher

Hindawi / Wiley

ISSN

1741-427X

Rights Statement

© 2020 He Cai et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.