ABSTRACT
Nearly 60-70% of the child Indian population suffers from dental caries. Mouth rinsing is the most cost effective method of preventing dental caries. 'Triphala' has been a classic Ayurveda remedy, probably the best known among all Ayurvedic compounds. This study was conducted on 1501 students in the age group of 8-12 years with the aim of determining the effect of Triphala mouthwash on prevention of dental caries (manifest caries) as well as incipient carious lesions, and also comparing the effect of Triphala and chlorhexidine mouthwashes. The incipient caries was recorded at 3, 6, 9 months intervals and manifest caries at 9 months interval. No significant increase in the DMFS scores was found at the end of 9 months. Also, there was no significant increase in the incipient caries score towards the conclusion of the study. It was concluded that there was no significant difference between the Triphala and the chlorhexidine mouthwashes.
ABSTRACT
The effect of 0, 5, 6.25, 10, 12.5, 20, 25, 40, 50 and 80 mg/kg b. wt. of aqueous extract of triphala (an Ayurvedic herbal medicine) administrered intraperitoneally was studied on the radiation-induced mortality in mice exposed to 10 Gy of gamma-radiation. Treatment of mice with different doses of triphala consecutively for five days before irradiation delayed the onset of mortality and reduced the symptoms of radiation sickness when compared with the non-drug treated irradiated controls. The highest protection against GI (gastrointestinal) death was observed for 12.5 mg/kg triphala, where a highest number of survivors were reported up to 10 days post-irradiation. While 10 mg/kg triphala i.p. provided the best protection as evidenced by the highest number of survivors after 30 days post-irradiation in this group when compared with the other doses of triphala. Toxicity study showed that triphala was non-toxic up to a dose of 240 mg/kg, where no drug-induced mortality was observed. The LD50 dose i.p. of triphala was found to be 280 mg/kg b. wt. Our study demonstrates the ability of triphala as a good radioprotective agent and the optimum protective dose of triphala was 1/28 of its LD50 dose.
