Burning mouth syndrome (BMS): an open trial of comparative efficacy of alpha-lipoic acid (thioctic acid) with other therapies.

BACKGROUND

Alpha-lipoic acid (ALA) is a potent antioxidant mitochondrial coenzyme, trometamol salt of thioctic acid, shown in clinical studies to be neuroprotective and in a preliminary study to have an effect on the symptomatology of Burning Mouth Syndrome (BMS).

METHODS

We were interested in extending our studies as to whether alpha-lipoic acid might improve the symptomatology in BMS and therefore carried out a larger open controlled clinical study on the effects of alpha-lipoic acid on BMS symptomatology.

RESULTS

We have examined the effects on 4 groups of 20 patients with BMS of ALA, compared with bethanecol, Biotene and placebo, and found ALA of remarkable benefit with minimal adverse effects.

CONCLUSIONS

These results suggest that double-blind randomized controlled multicenter studies of ALA are indicated.