According to the reports of a recently conducted randomized, single-blinded clinical study by the scientists of Tufts University School of Dental Medicine, pre-emptive analgesia with IV Ibuprofen provides effective ways to reduce opioid use and postoperative pain following the third molar surgery.

Participants who went through surgical extraction of two or more affected third molars under deep sedation were selected and randomized into receive either 1,000 mg of IV Acetaminophen or 800 mg of IV Ibuprofen. Postoperative pain estimated using the visual analog scale at different time points was considered as the primary outcome and the amount of postoperative analgesia obtained by both groups' patients as the secondary outcome. The comparison of both groups was done using the Mann-Whitney U test.

A total of 58 participants were selected, out of which 41 accomplished the analysis. The groups showed similar distributions of gender, age and number of affected teeth. The Ibuprofen group showed significantly lower pain levels than another group at four hours after the operation, and the outcomes remained constant for two days. Ibuprofen group also exhibited a lower intake of the average narcotic medication as compared to the acetaminophen group. Therefore, Ibuprofen provides significantly better outcomes than Acetaminophen after third molar surgery.