Family: Household chemicals & care
Powered toothbrush
Removes more plaque than a manual brush; in an abrasion experiment it also removes more dentin.
Overview
A meta-analysis of 51 trials in 4,624 participants gives the size of the advantage: an 11% reduction in plaque in the short term and 21% in the long term compared with a manual brush, plus less gingival inflammation. A 2019 review confirms the direction on a single brushing. There is a trade-off that reviews of plaque removal do not cover: in a machine experiment on dentin samples at equal force, powered brushes removed markedly more surface than a manual one — 21.03 and 15.71 micrometres against 6.13 over a simulated eight and a half years.
Quality indicators
- State of the evidence
Moderate quality, high heterogeneity, unclear risk of bias in most trials
More detail
The review names its own limits: moderate quality of evidence, high heterogeneity between trials (I² of 83% and 86%), five of fifty-six trials at low risk of bias and forty-six at unclear risk. The review is from 2014 and the platform marks it stale; the 2019 work measures a single brushing rather than a habit.
Health-related indicators
- What the research shows
Plaque lower by 11% in the short term and 21% in the long term
More detail
A meta-analysis of 51 trials in 4,624 participants: plaque reduced by 11% short term and 21% long term on the Quigley-Hein index, standardised mean differences of -0.50 and -0.47. For gingivitis the differences are -0.43 and -0.21. A 2019 review confirms the direction on a single brushing: a mean difference of -0.14.
- The known trade-off
In an abrasion experiment it removes three times as much dentin as a manual brush
More detail
At an equal force of 2 N and with one paste, over a simulated eight and a half years of brushing, a sonic brush removed 21.03 µm of dentin, an oscillating-rotating one 15.71 µm, and a flat-trim manual brush 6.13 µm. The experiment is a machine simulation on samples from extracted teeth, and carries across to real brushing only with that caveat.
What is nearby
Sources and evidence
Sources by kind of evidence
REVIEWSystematic review2
Reader reviews
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