THE BRUNEI TIMES Islamia

Friday, January 29, 2010

SIWAK- An Oral Health

Device

Health & Science

Preliminary Chemical and Clinical Evaluation

By Dr. M Ragaii El-Mostehy, Dr. AA Al-Jassem, Dr. IA Al-Yassin, Dr. AR El-Gindy and Dr. E Shoukry - Kuwait

variety of oral hygiene

measures have been
performed since the
dawn of time. This has been
verified by various excavations done all over the world,
in which toothpicks, chew
sticks, tree twigs, linen strips,
birds' feathers, animal bones
and porcupine quills were
recovered.
Those that originated from
plants are tasty twigs and
although primitive they represented a transitional step
towards the modern toothbrush. It has been stated that
about seventeen plants could
be enumerated as natural
sources for several of these
oral hygiene devices.
The most widely used tree
twigs since early times is the
..Siwak" or ..Miswak". The
stick is obtained from a plant
called Salvadore Persica that
grows around Mekah and the
Middle East area in general. It
is widely used among Muslims after Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) realised its value
as a device which
should be used
by Muslims

to clean their teeth. In this

respect our Prophet (PBUH)
is considered the first dental
educator in proper oral
hygiene.
Although there is no reference to the use of Siwak in
Al-Quran, yet several quotations could be read in the
compendium of the sayings
of Muhammad (PBUH) as to
the benefits of Siwak in
mouth
cleanliness.
One
saying reads as follows:

showed that it is composed

of:

"If it were not too much a

burden on the believers, I
would prescribe that they
use the siwak before
each prayer.

Purpose Of The Present

Investigation:
Because of the great quality
of oral cleanliness noticed in
individuals who use Siwak as
the sole device to brush their
teeth and because of the low
incidence of dental decay of
those individuals this work
was undertaken.
It is intended to study the
following:
1 .The mechanical ability of
Siwak as a cleaning device to
the mouth and its ability to rid
the mouth of bacterial plaque
(aggregates harmful to the
gum)
2. If Siwak is powdered and
used with a toothbrush, could
it act as an efficient mouth
cleaner?
3. As compared to other
strongly
abrasive
toothpowder's, could Siwak
rank as highly efficient as to
the used material?

Composition
Several
anecdotes,
incidents, and rules of ethics
in using Siwak were mentioned in various references
talking on the subject of
cleanliness of the mouth.
Salvadora Persica is in fact a
small tree or shrub with a
crooked trunk, seldom more
than one foot in diameter,
bark scabrous and cracked,
whitish
with
pendulous
extremities. The root bark is
light brown and the inner
surfaces are white, odour
like cress and taste is
warm and pungent.
Chemically the air dried
stem bark os S. Persica
is extracted with 80%
alcohol
and
then
extracted with ether
and run through
exhaustive chemical
procedures.
T h i s

1. Trim ethylamine
2. An alkaloid which
may be salvadorine
3. Chlorides
4. High amounts of
fluoride and silica
5. Sulphur
6. Vitamin C
7. Small amounts of
Tannins, saponins,
flavonoids & sterols

Discussion
Oral hygiene and patient
motivation towards a clean
mouth owe their birth to the
teachings of Muhammad
(PBUH). Due to the repeated
use of Siwak during the day,
the users showed an unusually high level of oral cleanliness. It is a well known
fact that plaque formed
immediately
after
meticulous tooth brushing.
By the end of 24 hours the
plaque is well on its way
towards
maturation
and
hence starts its deleterious

effects on the gingiva.

Proper oral hygiene should
be maintained through intensive instructions by the periodontist as well as by a great
expenditure of time and
dexterity on part of the
patient. This item is self
corrected in Muslims
because
Siwak
users

take
Siwak
as
a
device that
should be
used as part of their religious
ritual regimen.
The results obtained in this
investigation have proved that
Siwak and other tree twigs
could act as an effective tool
in removing soft oral deposits.
It could be even used as an
effective device in preventive
dental programme's in mass
populations. The indices used
in this investigations were
simple and adequate as they
discriminated
between
experimental stages as well
as between experimental
groups.
Using starch is not quite
accurate but it was meant to
evaluate the degree by which
Siwak and powdered Siwak
could rid teeth of deposits as
compared
to
the
best
abrasive viz. commercial
powder.
It is noticed that the difference between first and fifth
week of the mean score of
plaque
percentage
for
powdered Siwak is the
highest (-11.2%) of all readings. This indicates that
powdered Siwak is used with
t mechanically proper device
i.e. tooth brush will give a
great deal of oral cleanliness.

It has been reported that

Salvadora
Persica
c o n t a i n s
substances
t h a t
pos-

sess
antibacterial properties
Some other components are astringents,
detergents and abrasives 8.
Those properties encourage
some toothpaste laboratories
to incorporate powdered
stems and/or root material of
Salvadora Persica in their
products (Beckenham UK
Sarakan Ltd.).
Excellent Tools
Although the commercial
powder gave a high degree of
efficiency in plaque removal
yet its use over the experimental period gave a high
score of gingivitis percentage
within the group using the
powder. It is time that plaque
eradication is essential but
this should not be on the
expense of deleterious side
effect on other tissues.
It could be concluded that
Siwak and powdered Siwak
are excellent tools for oral
cleanliness. Because of its
availability in this part of the
world, being inexpensive and
readily adopted by Muslims
as part of their religious
regimen, it is highly recommended in implementing a
preventive
dental
health
program Islamic countries.
Also
recommendations
should be directed to manufacturers of toothpastes to
include the powdered form of
Siwak in a highly debriding
sophisticated toothpaste.

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