Objective: The aim of this pilot study was to investigate whether tooth brushing with a sonic toothbrush (SonicareR) causes bacteraemia and to compare this with an electric toothbrush (ETB) and conventional manual tooth brushing (CMT) techniques. Methods: Eleven subjects were recruited in a three-legged crossover randomised trial. These adult subjects attended the Children's Department at Leeds Dental Institute, where brushing techniques were standardised, and a single operator brushed the teeth of all the subjects for one minute throughout the study. Venous blood samples were taken immediately before brushing at baseline, 30 seconds and 2 minutes after brushing by. Blood samples were inoculated on Columbia Blood Agar and were identified using relevant kits. Saliva samples were also taken from each of the volunteers for colony counts of bacteria. Results: The bacterial counts were found to be very low and ranged between 1-4 cfu/ml of blood during the study. Bacteraemia was detected in venous blood samples taken from six out of 11 subjects before tooth brushing. After tooth brushing, bacteraemia was detected in venous blood samples in five out of 11 subjects whose teeth were brushed using CMT, from eight out of 11 subjects with ETB and five out of 11 subjects after brushing with Sonicare toothbrush. Statistical analysis using Chi-square test showed that significantly more number of subjects who used ETB showed presence of bacteraemia after brushing.Conclusion: The range of bacteraemia was low in whole of the study. Largest number of subjects found with bacteraemia were seen when the blood samples were taken after brushing the teeth with powered Braun Oral-B toothbrush (ETB) and least with SoincareR, but not significantly.

Back to the Microbiology / Immunology and Infection Control Program
Back to the 81st General Session of the International Association for Dental Research (June 25-28, 2003)

Top Level Search