www.ajethno.com American Journal of Ethnomedicine, 2014, Vol. 1, No. 1, 096-101 Available online at http://www.ajethno.com © American Journal of Ethnomedicine The Magic of Herbal Curcumin Therapy in Recurrent Oral Lichen Planus Sumanth Prasad, Savita Solanki*, Chinmaya BR, Shourya Tandon and Ashwini B S.G.T Dental College Gurgaon, Haryana, India ABSTRACT Oral lichen planus is a cell-mediated immune condition. It is one of the most common dermatological disease present in the oral cavity. It is mostly found in middle aged and elderly Indian population with a prevalence rate of 2.6%. The purpose of this article is to highlight a case of oral lichen planus affecting a 22- year-old male without concomitant cutaneous lesions who had been treated earlier with topical steroid but repeated recurrence of the lesion made us to shift the treatment from steroid to herbal curcumin which yielded positive results. Keywords- Oral lichen planus, Curcumin, Herbal therapy. INTRODUCTION Oral lichen planus (OLP) is a chronic inflammatory condition characterized by mucosal lesions of varying appearance and severity 3 . It has a global prevalence of about 0.5% to 2%, with prevalence rate of 2.6% in the Indian population 2 . It occurs more commonly in females with ratio of approximately 2:1 3,4 . It tends to be more persistent and more resistant to treatment 5 . The clinical presentation of OLP ranges from mild painless white keratotic lesions to painful erosions and ulcerations. Oral lichen planus is classified into reticular, erosive, atrophic, and bullous types 6 . The reticular form is the most common type and presents as papules and plaques with interlacing white keratotic lines (Wickham striae) with an erythematous border. The striae are typically located bilaterally on the buccal mucosa, mucobuccal fold, gingiva, and less commonly, the tongue, palate, and lips. The reticular type has been reported to occur significantly more often in men compared to women and is usually asymptomatic 7 . Erosive, atrophic, or bullous type lesions cause burning sensation and pain 8 . The treatment of oral lichen planus is corticosteroids which are widely used and the dosage depends on the severity of the lesion. The frequent use and misuse of currently used therapeutic agents has led to the evolution of resistant strains of common pathogens as well as increased incidence of adverse effects associated with their usage. So the search for the alternative medicinal treatment is still going on. Medicinal plants have been used as a traditional treatment agent for numerous human diseases in many parts of world. In rural areas of developing