clinical evaluation of the essential oil of pelargonium graveolens for the treatment of denture stomatitis

background: natural products are proved to play a good role as an alternative to synthetic chemicals in clinical conditions. previous studies showed that pelargonium graveolens has anti-inflammatory and antifungal activity against candida albicans . the aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of essential oil of pelargonium graveolens in the treatment of denture stomatitis . materials and methods: in this double-blind randomized clinical trial conducted in isfahan (iran), 80 (51 females and 29 males) eligible wearers of complete denture were included . according to the patients’ profiles number, they randomly divided to 2 groups of 40 patients’ case and 40 patients control treated with pelargonium 1% gel or placebo, respectively. they were recommended to apply the gel twice daily for a 14-day course. all data were analyzed using spss® for windows (v.18). we have used the c2 test for analyzing qualitative and student t -test for quantitative data considering as p <0.05 as significant. results: according to mycological data and clinical observation after treatment in the case group, 34% of patients had been improved completely, 56% partially and 10% had no improvement. in the control group, 5% of patients had complete recovery, 25% partial recovery, and 70% no improvement. a significant reduction in fungal growth was observed in case group rather than the control group ( p value<0.0001). conclusion: it seems that the application of a 1% geranium oil topical gel formulation is more effective than placebo in the treatment of denture stomatitis. key words: candida albicans , denture stomatitis, pelargonium graveolens