Effect of Mouthwash on Oral Microbiome Study
The test mouthwash did not significantly affect the oral microbiome after 30 and 90 days based on the endpoints evaluated in this study. However, in the oral microbiome the positive control mouthwash caused a significant mean reduction in overall microbial presence of 72% after 30 days and of 77% after 90 days in Firmicutes, Bacteroidetes, Actinobacteria, Proteobacteria, and Fusobacterium phyla, and in organisms including Actinomyces, Staphylococci, Streptococci, Lactobacilli, Aggregatibacter, Porphyromonas, Prevotella, Eikenella and Fusobacteria. Notably, in the positive control treatment group, data ranges (and S.D.s) for all variables increased significantly, almost by a factor of 3, between Day 30 and Day 90, giving rise to conjecture that the reaction of the oral microbiome to long-term use of the positive control mouthwash varies considerably between individuals. Most likely it depends on variables such as baseline oral microbiome composition, biofilm properties, oral pH and buffering, dietary habits. The wide range of effects by 90 days of the positive control mouthwash use (but not the test formulation) on the oral microbiome was especially interesting given that subjects in the 2 treatment groups were carefully age-matched (+ 3 years), gender-matched and race-matched.