A Randomized Double Blind Controlled Trial to Compare Metronidazole with Doxycycline for the Treatment of Oral Lichen Planus

Abstract

The aim of this study was to compare the efficacy of metronidazole with doxycycline in treatment of oral lichen planus. A double blind clinical trial was performed on twenty patients with asymptomatic oral lichen planus, confirmed by biopsy. After initial examination, patients were randomly assigned to receive 250 mg metronidazole or 100 mg doxycycline twice daily for 4 weeks. Target lesions were assessed at weeks 0, 2, 4 by grid measurement. Complete blood examination and liver function tests were done at fourth week. At the end of the trial, in the doxycycline group one (10%) patient showed partial remission and nine (90%) patients showed no response. In the metronidazole group one (10%) patient showed partial remission and one (10%) patient showed completed remission. Eight (80%) patients were unresponsive to metronidazole. No side-effects were reported from the subjects and there were no significant changes in complete blood examination and liver function test after four weeks of treatment in either group. Results of present study suggest that these drugs are not much effective in treatment of oral lichen planus and statistically significant difference was not seen between the two groups in respect to response to therapy at the end of treatment period (p>0.05, p = 0.503).