Oral cleanliness in daily users of powered vs. manual toothbrushes – a cross-sectional study

Abstract

Background Toothbrushing is a daily routine. Still, when adults are asked to manually perform oral hygiene to the best of their abilities, a considerable amount of plaque persists. Little is known about the performance of people who use a powered toothbrush. The present study thus analysed whether the capability to achieve oral cleanliness is better in people for whom powered toothbrushing is a daily routine. Methods University students, who either performed powered ( N = 55) or manual ( N = 60) toothbrushing for more than 6 months on a daily basis were asked to clean their teeth to the best of their abilities by their own device. Plaque was assessed prior to and immediately after brushing. Furthermore, gingival bleeding, recessions, periodontal pocket depths and dental status were assessed. Oral hygiene performance was video-taped and analyzed with respect to brushing duration, sites of brushing and application of interproximal cleaning devices. Results No differences between groups were found with respect to plaque before and after brushing, clinical parameters and overall brushing duration (all p > 0.05, all d < 0.156). After brushing, plaque persisted at approximately 40% of the sections adjacent to the gingival margin in both groups. Conclusions No advantage of daily powered toothbrushing as compared to daily manual toothbrushing was seen with respect to oral hygiene or clinical parameters. The capability to achieve oral cleanliness was low, irrespective of the type of toothbrush under consideration. Additional effort is thus needed to improve this capability. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s12903-019-0790-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Periodontitis: still more to learn about - Results of a telephone survey in Germany

“…Less than 10% mentioned the gingival margins, a region of speci c importance when it comes to the prevention of periodontal disease. Again, this re ects ndings of a series of studies in different age groups, which found that plaque persisted at 50% of the gingival margins or more even when people performed oral hygiene to the best of their abilities (11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16). Similarly, in these and the above-mentioned observational studies participants often neglected inner surfaces.…”

“…Only 31% of university students and only 15% of a random sample of 18-year olds even used devices for proximal hygiene. In addition, most of these participants used it in an un-proper way and did not reach all proximal spaces (12,16).…”

“…Again, this nding con rms what studies on actual tooth brushing performance show. These studies revealed that most people brush their teeth unsystematically and often neglect a number of areas while brushing (12,(15)(16)(17)(18)(19). Furthermore, a comparison between a cohort of 18-year olds that had been asked to brush their teeth as they normally do and a comparable cohort been asked to brush their teeth to the best of their abilities revealed no improvement of systematics.…”

“…Recent studies in Germany also found that children and adults have di culties to achieve oral cleanliness even when they perform to the best of their abilities (11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16). This and results of studies observing people's oral hygiene performance (12,(15)(16)(17)(18)(19) indicate that there might also exist knowledge gaps regarding proper oral hygiene behavior.…”

Cleansing efficacy of an auto-cleaning electronic toothbrushing device: a randomized-controlled crossover pilot study

“…In the authors' opinion, the development of auto-cleaning devices seems a gratifying approach to increase both the frequency and the efficacy of toothbrushing which have been ascertained to be insufficient in the majority of adults and adolescents/children [3][4][5][6]19]. Therefore, we undertook analyses to spot the reasons for the lack of efficacy of the amabrush® design.…”