Daily Toothbrushing Reduces Risk of Pneumonia

Hospital-acquired pneumonia and ventilator-acquired pneumonia develop 48 hours or more after admission and after the beginning of ventilator support, respectively,¹  and they are among the most common causes of hospital-acquired infections.²  Oral microbiota play an important role in the pathogenesis of respiratory tract infections. In healthy individuals, the saliva does its lubricating and antibacterial tasks. It minimizes the invasion of pathogens into the respiratory tract. In hospitalized patients, particularly critically ill patients, oral hygiene is often not given enough attention, leading to the formation of dental plaques and biofilms containing high numbers of organisms implicated in pneumonia, particularly Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Acinetobacter species, and enteric species.³  Ventilator tubing and instrumentation provide a conduit for such oral pathogens into the respiratory tract.

Techniques have been proposed to tackle these challenges. The use of toothbrushing, topical oral antibiotics, and chlorhexidine application has been discussed in the literature,^4...