The Effect of Mobile Text Messages and a Novel Floss Holder on Gingival Health: A randomized control trial

Mário-Rui Araújo; Maria-João Alvarez; Cristina A Godinho

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Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of using mobile text messages and a novel floss holder as compared to finger flossing or the novel floss holder alone, on the psychological, behavioral, and clinical parameters of patients with gingivitis.

Methods: A total 165 adults were assessed for eligibility and 144 met the criteria for randomization into three groups: Finger Floss (FF, n=43), Novel Floss Holder (NFH, n= 40), and Novel Floss Holder plus Text Messages (NFH+TM, n= 61) following a dental hygiene consultation appointment. Gingival bleeding points were measured on probing (BOMP) at baseline and four months later by a calibrated dental hygienist, blinded to the experimental groups. Participants also self-reported their oral hygiene behaviors, and indicated psychological determinants of behavior change prior to the dental hygiene consultation and at four months. Descriptive statistics and repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) were used to compare groups over time.

Results: Two subjects dropped out of the study making the total number of participants 142. At the four month follow-up, the NFH group and the NFH+TM groups demonstrated significantly higher levels of self-reported flossing, action self-efficacy, intention, action planning, and action control. The NFH+TM group showed lower levels of bleeding and higher levels of oral hygiene and recovery self-efficacy than the other groups, in addition to higher levels of maintenance self-efficacy as compared to the FF group.

Conclusions: The use of a novel floss holder, NFH, was shown to improve the behavioral and psychological determinants of periodontal health four months after introduction of the device. However the clinical measures of BOMP only improved significantly when used in conjunction with text messages (NFH+TM). The use of a consciousness awareness technique,TMs, in combination with a novel device, may help patients to reach therapeutic objectives and contribute to the management of periodontal pathologies such as gingivitis.

Footnotes

Mário-Rui Araújo, M. Psych, BSDH is a doctoral student at School of Psychology, University of Lisbon, CICPSI, Lisbon and an adjunct professor at Escola Superior de Saúde de Portalegre, Portalegre, Portugal.
Maria-João Alvarez, PhD is an associate professor at University of Lisbon, Department of Psychology, CICPSI, Lisbon, Portugal.
Cristina A Godinho, PhD is a researcher at Universidade Católica Portuguesa, Católica Research Centre for Psychological - Family and Social Wellbeing, Lisbon, Portugal.
This manuscript supports the NDHRA priority area, Client level: Oral health care (new therapies and prevention modalities).
Disclosure
The authors received material support from Oral Wise, Inc.; Calabasas, CA, USA, for the novel floss holder (GumChucks™) used in this study. This product is not marketed in Portugal. The authors did not receive any financial support for this study.