Rinsing with an essential oil mouthwash reduces the levels of germs that travel from the mouth to the bloodstream – so preventing the spread of infection.
That’s the finding of US Professor Daniel Fine, who presented his clinical evidence at Europerio 6 in Sweden last month.
He suggests that the mouthwash can provide a vital tool in the battle against bacteremia.
At a symposium entitled ‘Microbial invasion: the oral systemic link?’, Professor Fine presented the findings of studies carried out to see if antiseptic mouthwash can reduce bacteremia.
The results showed that using essential oil mouthwash twice daily for two weeks reduced aerobic bacteremia by 76% and anaerobic bacteremia by 80.2% in subjects who had moderate plaque and gingivitis.
The link between chronic oral infections and systemic diseases was discussed by Panos Papapanou, in a complementary presentation – ‘Systemic effects of periodontal infections: biological plausability’, and Denis Kinane, whose speech was called ‘How can the oral inflammatory burden impact the whole body?’.
They introduced scientific information on the links and presented new evidence behind the inflammatory and micro-biological pathways.
The symposium was moderated by Professor Mariano Sanz, who said in his opening speech: ‘In the last 10 years a rising number of investigations have studied the possible association between chronic oral infections and systemic diseases as these are among the most prevalent chronic infections in humans.
‘There is a mounting scientific interest and public awareness of these possible interactions, mainly due to the likely public health implications if these associations are shown to be significant and clinically relevant.’
The symposium was sponsored by Johnson and Johnson who produce Listerine mouthwash, which contains essential oils.
