Extended Antimicrobial Activity Of Oral Care Breath Strips

INTRODUCTION: The purpose of this research was to assess the antimicrobial activity of an oral care breath strip containing pullulan and essential oils (CoolMint Listerine PocketPaks^®) against oral malodor microorganisms in an in vivo germ kill model for up to 90 minutes after a single dose. This supports previous work (Abst. #577, IADR 2000), which showed significant reduction in oral malodor microorganisms 60 minutes after a single dose of a prototype oral care breath strip. METHOD: The randomized, controlled, observer-blind, crossover studies compared the effect of the product to a no treatment control. Baseline recoverable microbial counts were assessed by sampling the right side of each subject’s tongue with a sterile swab, which was placed in 0.1% peptone broth, diluted and plated on selective medium. The assigned oral care strip was dissolved on the left side of the subject’s tongue, which was sampled 60 or 90 minutes later. The primary efficacy variable was the log10-transformed number of dark pigmented (volatile sulfur compound-producing) microbial colonies averaged over duplicate plates. Forty-eight hours later, subjects received the alternate treatment(s). This product was evaluated in three sixty-minute studies and four 90-minute studies. RESULTS: In all studies, the oral care strips provided significant (p<0.001) reductions in odor-causing oral microorganisms relative to the no treatment control. At 60 minutes after the single dose, the reduction ranged from 54.1% to 76.4%, and at ninety minutes the reduction ranged from 66.3% to 74.7%. CONCLUSIONS: These studies demonstrate the long-lasting (60-90 min) antimicrobial efficacy of the commercially available oral care strips due to the unique formula containing pullulan and Listerine^® essential oils. They also highlight the reproducibility of the in vivo germ kill model for assessing antimicrobial activity of oral care breath strips.