Posted by Captin Cannuck on April 02, 2008 at 12:02:49:In Reply to: Re: Warning- Chlorhexidine rinse posted by sleepy-in-seattle on April 02, 2008 at 07:56:21:
Do I have any data to back it up? Not really, but at the same time, in a way I do. I have just looked on the net, and there are a number of articles that suggest that Chlorhexidine has a protective property to it in most cases. What you say is correct. On the other hand, I have seen several mentions that it has the side effect of staining your teeth. The residents who were involved in my care warned me about this. They also told me that in very rare cases that it could effect the enamel. Sure enough, It did stain my teeth. My dentist had to burnish the stain off. I think that I was one of the unlucky rare cases where it effected the enamel in a negative way. Maybe in my case it was Murphy's Law.
I found an article that deals with the effect of Chlorhexidine on enamel. You can see in one revealing passage, it is stated that:
….“In the orthodontic literature, there is little or no information about the use of mouthwash forms of povidone-iodine. There also are limited studies on the chlorhexidine mouth rinse on bonding to the enamel before placing the bracket. Even though applying chlorhexidine to the enamel surface could add an increased protection around the bracket periphery against bacteria, it could also influence the bond strength adversely, depending on the method of application”.To me it sounds as though the medical/dental community has not studied the matter enough.
That is all I could find on it in terms of "hard" data. I do have an anecdotal piece of evidence in that one of the girls who worked for my orthodontist said that it was not the first time she had seen this happen. She guessed correctly that I had used Chlorhexidine. My orthodontist asked me if I had eaten anything very acidic. I told him no, but that they had given me this rinse, Chlorhexidine and had given me some disclaimers about it. Then, when I said that, the assistant kind of nodded her head in a knowing way..."Chlorhexidine", she said. I guess that is why I assume it was Chlorhexidine that was responsible for the damage to the enamel in my case. On the other hand, there could have been some other reason. I just dont' know what it could have been. I only ate normal foods and drank Ensure. The only other thing I could think of was that I took an oral pain killer (Dilaudid). I don't know that it is acidic.
For now then, I will advise people to look into this. Ask your dentist lots of questions about it.
Some Reference info follows:
The Angle Orthodontist: Vol. 75, No. 3, pp. 392–396.
Effects of Chlorhexidine and Povidone-Iodine Mouth Rinses on the Bond Strength of an Orthodontic Composite
Abdullah Demir;a Siddik Malkoc;b Abdulkadir Sengun;c Alp Erdin Koyuturk;d Yagmur Senerehttp://www.angle.org/anglonline/?request=get-document&issn=0003-3219&volume=075&issue=03&page=0392
- Re: Warning- Chlorhexidine rinse sleepy-in-seattle 11:21 4/03/08 (2)
- Re: Warning- Chlorhexidine rinse Captin Cannuck 12:45 4/03/08 (1)
- Re: Warning- Chlorhexidine rinse Jeremy 05:28 4/04/08 (0)