Table 4.

Estimated evidence profile appraisal of the strength of the recommendation and the direction regarding the single‐use efficacy of oscillating‐rotating compared with high‐frequency power toothbrushes on dental plaque removal

Determinants of quality	Plaque index score
Study design (Appendix S1A,B)	RCTs crossover and parallel designs
#studies N = 15 #experiments N = 17 #comparisons N = 34 (Figure 1)	34
Risk of bias (Appendix S2)	Low
Consistency (Tables 2 and 3)	Rather inconsistent
Directness (single‐brushing exercise)	Rather generalizable
Precision (Table 3A, 3B, 3C, 4)	Precise
Reporting bias (Appendix S6D)	Possible to likely
Magnitude of the effect (Table 3A, 3B, 3C, 4)	Very small
Strength of the recommendation based on the quality and body of evidence	Moderate
Direction of recommendation	There is moderate certainty of evidence of a very small but significant beneficial effect with the OR‐PTB over the HFS‐PTB. However, there is uncertainty that the clinical impact of this in long term is beneficial.

Abbreviations: HFS‐PTB, high‐frequency sonic power toothbrush; OR‐PTB, oscillating‐rotating power toothbrush.