A five-day essential oil course matched ten-day penicillin for acute sore throat.

Across 97 primary care patients, oral essential oil therapy and penicillin V produced equivalent symptom relief by day three, and treating doctors judged that roughly 87 percent of essential oil patients avoided antibiotics altogether.

97 patients

Spanish primary care

Three-arm comparison

P < 0.001

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All three arms converged to comparable relief

Sore throat, VAS 0 to 10

Penicillin V, 10 days Essential oil, standard dose, 5 days Essential oil, double dose, 5 days

Adapted from Ciprandi et al., Otorhinolaryngology 2025. Curves illustrate the published trend across the three groups.

Published in Otorhinolaryngology (Minerva Medica)
Access Open, peer-reviewed
DOI 10.23736/S2724-6302.25.02594-0
Cohort 97 adults, real-world primary care

What the data showed

Comparable relief, half the treatment duration, fewer antibiotics

Every measure improved across all three groups, and the essential oil arms reached the same place as penicillin while running half as long.

P<0.001

Every arm improved significantly

Sore throat, general condition, and body temperature improved across all three groups, with significant gains visible by day three.

5 vs 10

Half the treatment duration

The essential oil course ran five days and produced relief comparable to a ten-day penicillin V course.

87.9%

Most patients avoided antibiotics

Treating doctors judged that 87.9 percent of standard-dose and 85.3 percent of double-dose essential oil patients avoided antibiotics.

89.1%

Patients would choose it again

89.1 percent of essential oil patients reported they would use the same therapy for a future episode of sore throat.

10 / 97

Adverse events stayed mild

Ten patients across all arms reported adverse reactions, and every event was mild and self-resolving.

=

Standard dosing was enough

The double dose matched the standard dose on every outcome, which supports the simpler regimen for most patients.

The tested formula

Oleobiotic Salud Respiratoria, five essential oils

Daily dose of three capsules, taken with meals across five days. Manufactured by Pranarōm International S.A.

135 mg

Oregano

Origanum vulgare

120 mg

Eucalyptus

Eucalyptus sp.

90 mg

Cinnamon

Cinnamomum cassia

60 mg

Scots pine

Pinus sylvestris

45 mg

Lemon peel

Citrus limon

Each essential oil was selected for documented antimicrobial, antiviral, and anti-inflammatory activity, and the blend was studied as a multi-component food supplement for respiratory health.

Inside the full study

Everything your download includes

The three-arm methodology comparing penicillin V against standard and double essential oil dosing
All four outcome figures, including daily sore throat, general condition, and body temperature curves
The complete dosing schedule and the full essential oil composition by weight
The full safety profile and the patient and physician satisfaction results
The complete reference list and the citable DOI for your records

Read it through a real-world lens

This was a pragmatic primary care study with an open-label design and no placebo arm. That design trades some experimental control for something prescribers rarely see, which is how a therapy performs in the daily reality of a clinic.

For naturopathic and integrative medicine practitioners working within an antibiotic stewardship framework, the consistent improvement across 97 real patients offers a grounded starting point for conversations about botanical options in mild to moderate sore throat.

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Published open access · CC BY-NC 4.0 · Hosted by the Journal of Applied Natural Medicine

Citation. Ciprandi G, Varricchio A, Study Group on Respiratory Infection Management in Clinical Practice. Oral essential oil therapy for managing patients with acute pharyngotonsillitis in primary care setting: a real-world experience. Otorhinolaryngology 2025;75(4):113-9. DOI: 10.23736/S2724-6302.25.02594-0.

Journal of Applied Natural Medicine · NDNR · ndnr.com