Dental Caries: A Review on Etiology, Therapeutic Approaches, Novel Formulations, and Marketed Preparations

Abstract

Demineralization of dental enamel (dental caries) are widely prevalent throughout the world. According to the Global Oral Health Data Bank, this prevalence varies from 49% to 83% across different countries. Dental caries are a polyfactorial disease that still needs major pharmaceutical interventions to alleviate its prevalence. This paper delineates the latest understanding of pathological and protective factors associated with caries development. Based on the current knowledge of etiological factors, many therapeutic classes have been traversed since the past to decrease the severity of the disease. This includes drugs of herbal origin and synthetic molecules. On active ingredients, the latest pharmaceutical technologies have been applied to formulate novel drug delivery systems to accentuate the impact of drug delivery to combat the prevalence of the disease. A few of these novel formulations have been also been marketed. The present article explicates current etiological understanding on dental caries, therapeutic classes explored until now along with herbal classes and compounds, novel therapeutic systems, and marketed preparations used in dental formulations and future strategies to develop the efficient formulation.