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Aim of the Study: The present study was aimed to assess the knowledge and experience of women about dental services utilization during pregnancy. Methodology: A hospital-based, cross-sectional questionnaire-based study was conducted among 300 women of age between 18 and 45 years who attended Malla Reddy Dental Hospital during 3 months period from October 2019 to December 2019. A questionnaire was distributed to all the participants who had given consent to participate in the study. Results: Only 30.7% of the participants attended for dental checkup during their pregnancy. Among them, most of the people (52%) had visited dentist for toothache, followed by gum care (29.34%) and regular checkup (18.47%). Most of the subjects (69.3%) did not use dental services as they were unaware of dental checkup during pregnancy. A significant difference was found between the urban and rural participants regarding the visit to the dentist during pregnancy (P = 0.000, Chi-square value = 19.157). Conclusion: Most of the women unaware of dental checkup during pregnancy. They were also not sure aware of dental treatments which can be done during pregnancy and consequences of poor oral hygiene on pregnancy outcome.

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Objective: Dental caries is an infectious disease in which S. mutans plays a key role. Haphazard and irrational use of antibiotics leads to antibiotic resistance and fatal diarrhoeal diseases in children. Antimicrobial potency of Terminalia chebula and Piper nigrum extracts against several bacterial strains have been documented. The aims of this study were to assess and compare the antimicrobial activities of T. chebula and P. nigrum extracts against S. mutans with Ciprofloxacin as the positive control. Materials and Methods: For this purpose, S. mutans was isolated from plaque samples of people with active caries lesions.  Antimicrobial potency of both T. chebula and P.nigrum were tested using agar well diffusion method. Results: All the tested extracts showed antibacterial activity against S. mutans bacteria. Regarding the two tested herbs extracts, a higher antimicrobial activity was shown by the methanol extract of T. chebula with a mean diameter of inhibition zone was 26.75mm and a minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) at 25mg /ml concentration followed by acetonic extract. Conclusion: These findings confirm the Antimicrobial potency of T. chebula which can be used as an alternative antibiotic and/or in combination with allopathic antibiotics to prevent the antibiotic resistance.