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<h3>More and more patients use nutritional supplements and herbal products. Some may help your mouth, but others can sometimes interfere with your treatment.</h3> <p>More and more people are augmenting their diets with nutritional supplements such as vitamins, minerals and herbal products. </p> <p>Although you may not think of vitamins, minerals and herbs in the same category as prescription drugs, dental patients should remember to tell dental practitioners when they are taking these products. These products can influence your treatment and affect surgical procedures. </p> <p>However, far from looking down on nutritional supplements, dental practitioners may actually recommend that patients use certain products that include ingredients such as aloe vera, blood root, calendula, echinacea, folate, goldenseal, grape-fruit seed and lysine. Recent research has demonstrated how some of these compounds can improve the health of your gums. </p> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" width="85%" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td align="left"> "Patients should mention any herbal medicines or dietary supplements they take, because the ingredients can affect dental treatment in several ways. The American Dental Association notes how supplements such as gingko biloba, silver and vitamins A and D can sometimes lead to mouth problems and surgical complications." </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right"> <b><a href="http://www.ada.org/prof/resources/pubs/thera/" target="_blank"><i>ADA Guide to Dental Therapeutics</i></a> <br> edited by Sebastian G. Ciancio, D.D.S.</b> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </center> <p>Researchers say some herbs can interfere with blood clotting, affect blood pressure and the beating of the heart, or increase the affect of sedatives before and after surgery. </p> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" width="85%" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td align="left"> " 'Some herbals can interact with anesthetics and have adverse effects, while others post potential risks regardless of their interaction with anesthesia,' said Charles H. McLeskey, M.D., chair of anesthesiology and director of perioperative services at Scott & White Memorial Hospital and Clinic of Texas A&M University... He recommends that health care practitioners ask their patients to stop taking any herbal medications two to three weeks before surgery. If that's not possible, patients should bring all of their medications and supplements in the original containers with them to surgery." </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right"> <b><i>The Journal of the<br> American Dental Association</i> <br> December 1999, p. 1698</b> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </center> <p>Along with gingko biloba, echinacea, feverfew, garlic, ginseng, goldenseal, kava, St. John's wort, saw palmetto, ephedra, ginger, licorice, evening primrose and valerian account for nine out of ten herbal supplements sold in the U.S., even though more than 1,500 such medications are on the market. </p> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" width="85%" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td align="left"> "Increasing use of herbal supplements by Americans appears to demand that dentists be more knowledgeable about such products, writes Worku Abebe, PhD, in the December 2002 New York State Dental Journal... Abebe says there are various reasons for patients' lack of disclosure of their use of herbal supplements. Some reasons are embarrassment at admitting to seeking unconventional therapies, the assumption that health care providers may not be interested in this form of therapy, and belief that herbs are not drugs but nutritional substances." </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right"> <b><a href="http://www.ada.org/prof/resources/pubs/epubs/digest/index.asp#archives" target="_blank"><i>Dental Editor's Digest</i></a></b> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </center> <p>Patients who swear by nutritional supplements and herbal products may be surprised to learn that dental researchers are taking them seriously, too. </p> <p>For some time, studies have shown how tablets and mouth rinses containing certain ingredients can reduce gum inflammation and treat pain after dental surgery. </p> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" width="85%" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td align="left"> "An herbal mouth rinse had a statistically significant effect against gingivitis and gingival bleeding, according to a study published in Volume IX, number 4 of <i>The Journal of Clinical Dentistry</i> by W. Scherer, DDS, J. Gultz, DDS, S. Sangwoo Lee, BA, BS, and J. Kaim, DDS. The three-month study of Herbal Mouth and Gum Therapy mouthrinse at the New York University College of Dentistry revealed a 26.9 percent reduction in gingivitis as measured on the Loe and Silness Gingival Index, compared to an 11.3 percent reduction with an inert control mouthrinse. Herbal Mouth and Gum Therapy users in the study also had a 31.4 percent reduction in gingival bleeding, compared to a 10.2 percent reduction for the control group." </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right"> <b><i>Journal of the<br> New Jersey Dental Association</i><br> Volume 70, Number 4</b> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </center> <br> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" width="85%" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td align="left"> "A double blind study was designed to determine the effects of folate mouthwash (MW) on established gingivitis in non-pregnant adults... the experimental group showed a significant decrease in mean number of colour change sites and in bleeding sites compared with control group... Dietary analysis showed that few subjects ate greater than 200 micrograms folate daily. However, the level of folate did not correlate with changes in inflammation in experimental subjects. Folate MW appears to have an influence on gingival health through local rather than systemic influence. </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right"> <b>Pack AR, <i>J Clin Periodontol</i>, October 1984, as summarized in <a href="http://www.lef.org/protocols/abstracts/abstr-052.html" target="_blank"> <i>"Research Abstracts"</i></a> obtained from the Medline service maintained by the National Institutes of Health.</b> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </center> <br> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" width="85%" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td align="left"> "Results of the study seem to indicate that folic acid absorbed by the gingiva from an oral rinse may reverse a hypothesized local deficiency of the vitamin within the gingiva and thus lead to a reduction of gingival inflammation by increasing host resistance to local etiologic factors." </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right"> <b>Vogel RI, Fink RA, Frank O, Baker H, <i>J Oral Med</i>, January 1978, as summarized in <i>"Research Abstracts"</i> obtained from the Medline service maintained by the National Institutes of Health.</b> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </center> <br> <center> <table cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0" width="85%" align="center"> <tbody> <tr> <td align="left"> "Lysine clonixinate (LC), an effective and well tolerated non-morphinic analgesic whose mechanism of action is basically due to the inhibition of cyclo-oxygenase, was assessed with a double-blind randomized dummy design versus paracetamol (P) on 200 patients suffering from pain after minor dental surgery. Patients received according to their needs 1 or 2 tablets of 125 mg lysine clonixinate or 500 mg paracetamol every 8 hours during 48 hours or until pain relief... It was found that spontaneous pain measured using a visual analogue scale (VAS) decreased significantly in both treatment groups... Other variables like facial swelling and night pain, evaluated on a score from 0 to 4 and symptom presence or absence respectively, showed a similar response." </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="right"> <b>Marti ML, De los Santos AR, Di Girolamo G, Gil M, Manero EO, Fraga C, <i>Int J Tissue React</i> 1993, as summarized in <i>"Research Abstracts"</i> obtained from the Medline service maintained by the National Institutes of Health.</b> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </center>
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