Study design and sample
periodontitis, bleeding, PD, tooth
PERIODONTITIS, BLEEDING, ALVEOLAR BONE LOSS, PLAQUE
The present RCT was performed according to the 2016 Helsinki Declaration on medical research. The ethical approval was obtained from the International Review Board of the University of Catania, Catania, Italy (22–149 PO). All participants signed the research informed consent; the study was retrospectively registered on clinicaltrials.gov (NCT05720481–09/02/23). The study was conducted in accordance with the CONSORT guidelines [For the present RCT, consecutive patients with a diagnosis of periodontitis [The inclusion criteria were (1) good general health, (2) a minimum of six teeth per quadrant, (3) at least two teeth in each quadrant with a probing depth (PD) ≥ 5 mm and a clinical attachment loss (CAL) ≥ 4 mm, (4) at least 40% of periodontal sites with bleeding on probing (BOP), and (5) at least 2 sites with radiographically verifiable alveolar bone loss (ABL) [After the identification of each eligible participant, medical history, demographic aspects such as age, gender, body mass index (BMI), comorbidities (if present), medicines, and levels of education recording of PD, BOP, gingival recession, and plaque index score was carried out. BMI (kg/mSubsequently, all recruited patients received a comprehensive dental and oral examination performed by 2 masked examiners. The periodontal examination was achieved using a conventional periodontal probe at six sites per tooth (UNC-15, Hu-Friedy, Italy), recording PD, BOP [