Assessment of Antibiotics and Fluoride Toothpastes against Pathogenic Bacteria associated with Dental Caries

Abstract

Dental caries is the most contagious disease throughout the world. In the present study, a total of 100 dental caries patients were selected and samples from these patients were collected through sterile pincers for microbiological examination. A total of 9 different pathogenic bacterial isolates were identified through conventional culturing technique and among them maximum number of occurrence was by Salmonella spp (26.13%), followed by E. coli (17.39%), Proteus spp (17.39%), Shigella spp (8.69%), Pseudomonas spp (8.69%), Vibrio spp (8.69%), Enterobacter spp (4.34%), Yersinia spp (4.34%) and S. mutans (4.34%). Furthermore, antibiotic susceptibility tests were performed by 9 different commercially available antibiotics i.e. vancomycin, erythromycin, clindamycin, amoxicillin, tetracycline, rifampicin, ampicillin, ticarcillin and metronidazole/silver sulphadizine. Kirby Bauer disc diffusion method was used against test organisms and it was observed that all these antibiotics expressed significant activity against greater part of test organisms but few of them showed resistance to metronidazole/silver sulphadizine. In addition to this, different toothpastes encoded as TP-1, TP-2, TP-3, TP-4 and TP-5 were used at a concentration of 20 mg/mL in order to evaluate their activity against test organisms and it was observed that all these toothpastes showed significant activity against isolated bacteria. It was concluded that all these toothpastes contained fluoride which supports to avoid tooth decay and promote minty fresh breath. Furthermore, it was recommended that avoid usage of too much sweets, chocolates, candies especially in children/adults, and there must be a proper use of toothpastes twice a day at every stage of life. Keywords: Dental Caries, Pathogenic Bacteria, Antibiotics, Fluoride Toothpastes