Chewing Sticks and Oral Health Care in Owo Local Government, Ondo State

-the aim of this study is to carried out the Antimicrobial and phytochemical effect on five medicinal plants used as chewing sticks in Owo local government of Ondo State, Nigeria. Methods- The methods used for this study are antimicrobial assay, and phytochemical screening. The  aqueous, ethanol and  ethyl acetate  extracts  of  the  leaves,  bark  and  roots  of  Distemonantus bentaminaitus , Anogeissus leiocarpus, Garcina kola, Piper guineense and Zanthoxylun Lessmamul for the possible source of antimicrobial and phytochemical constituent. The preliminary evaluation of ethanol and aqueous extracts  of the plant exhibits appreciable inhibitory activities against the test organisms, while ethyl acetate extract exhibits low inhibitory activity. the test organisms are Staphylococcus mutan, Neisseria sieca, Lactobacillus salivarius, Actinomycetes viscosus and Streptococcus aureus. Garcina kola, Zanthoxylun Lessmamul, Distemonantus bentaminaitus exhibits the high antimicrobial activity and phytochemical constituent and while Piper guineense and  Anogeissus leiocarpus shows the low activity against the test organism. Phytochemical constituent of the plant were also investigated, it was observed that, the plant understudy contain some vital phytochemical, namely, alkaloids, tannins, saponin, steroids, plobatanin, terpenoids, flavonoids and cardiac glycosides.