A recent study depicted that etodolac (ETO) and dexamethasone (DEX) in combination is efficient for improving preemptive analgesia in third molar surgery.

A randomized and controlled crossover clinical trial was conducted to examine the use of ETO and DEX as preventative analgesia in mandibular third molar extraction preoperatively. In this study, patients were divided into three groups (each having twenty patients) based on the drug administration: 8 mg DEX; 8 mg DEX plus 300 mg ETO, and 300 mg ETO.

The pain was evaluated by utilizing a visual analog scale (VAS) at regular intervals after the surgery. Along with this, trismus and edema were evaluated 48 and 72 h after the surgery. All the data were analyzed statistically, where a P-value < 0.05 shown statistical significance.

VAS scores were lesser in the DEX+ ETO group than in the other cohorts, as depicted in the following figure:

However, trismus was similar in all the cohorts, at 48 hours but the ETO group showed the maximum trismus seven days after the surgery. Edema was the same amongst all groups at all the time points. The comparison of facial edema (mm) and interincisal trismus (mm) at the different postoperative evaluations is depicted in the following table:

This combination of drugs was also found to minimize the utilization of rescue analgesics in the postoperative period.

As the results were clinically relevant, the combination of ETO and DEX could be the choice of treatment offering pain relief before the third molar surgery.