BDJ open
Adjunctive antimicrobial photodynamic therapy in the nonsurgical treatment of periodontitis: an umbrella review
By Mehta V, Patil S, Dash KS and 1 others.
Abstract
Aim
Antimicrobial photodynamic therapy (aPDT) has been proposed as a locally acting adjunct to subgingival instrumentation for periodontitis. This umbrella review aimed to synthesize and critically appraise systematic reviews of adjunctive aPDT during active nonsurgical periodontal therapy, with emphasis on methodological confidence, clinical importance, and overlap of the evidence base.
Method
PubMed/MEDLINE, the Cochrane Library, Epistemonikos and Google Scholar were searched from inception through 24 July 2026, supplemented by backward and forward citation searching. For Google Scholar, the first 200 relevance-ranked results were screened, and exact-title and author searches were used to identify additional review reports. Systematic reviews with or without meta-analysis were eligible when they evaluated aPDT added to subgingival instrumentation and reported separable clinical evidence for adults receiving active nonsurgical treatment. Reporting followed PRISMA 2020 and PRIOR. Methodological confidence was appraised with AMSTAR 2; ROBIS domains were used as an interpretive framework rather than as a formal domain-by-domain rating tool. One reviewer completed selection, extraction and appraisal using a prespecified form and a structured second source-check pass for eligibility and numerical data.