Over the last number of years, associations have
been made between gum disease and a number of conditions and illnesses
including Alzheimer's, pancreatic cancer, and heart disease. Oral hygiene is not
just about having a million dollar smile and studies are showing that good oral
maintenance is can be a preventative measure against certain chronic and long
term illnesses. Recent research presents findings in support of
suspicions relating to gum disease and the manifold effects it is thought to
have on the body.
In 2010, researchers at New York University discovered a link
between Alzheimer's and gum disease. Their conclusions were based on twenty
years of research on the topic and looked specifically at cognitive function in
patients with gum disease. The test for cognitive function is called the ‘digit
symbol test’ (DST) and low scores were associated in patients with gum
inflammation. 152 Danish subjects were tested at the age of 50 and again at 70.
Those with low scores on the DST at 70 also suffered with inflammation of the
gums. The study even took into account poor oral health that might have been
associated with obesity or smoking but despite considering these risk factors,
the correlation between these low scores and gum disease was significant.
A more recent study, carried out in the UK in 2013, looked at
brain samples from 10 Alzheimer’s patients and 10 brain samples from subjects
who did not suffer with the condition. The study gleaned that porophyromonas
gingivalis, a bacterium that is associated with chronic gum disease, was found
only in the brain samples of the Alzheimer’s sufferers. More recently, the same
team, at the University of Central Lancashire, carried out a mouse study
earlier this year. The study evidenced that two out of the three main gum
disease causing bacteria are motile. This means that they are often found in
brain tissue having travelled from the mouth. Their mobility allows them to
travel via the roots of the teeth, through the nerves that connect these roots
to the brain, and they can also travel to the brain via the circulatory system,
i.e, the blood. The study also supported their hypothesis that the chemicals
released by the brain in response to this bacterium, actually damage neurons in
the area of the brain associated with memory.
Gum disease is also thought to be strongly associated with
pancreatic cancer and a team at the Harvard School of Public Health made their
suspicions known in 2007 having examined periodontitis, a type of gum disease
affecting tissue that supports the teeth.
Looking through data from more than 50,000 men, over a period that
spanned almost thirty years, it was found that men with a history of such gum
problems had a 64 percent greater risk of pancreatic cancer than men who never
had gum disease. The study cannot tell us if the gum disease causes the cancer
or if it’s the other way around, but we know for sure that there is a strong
link between the two conditions in this case.
The relationship between gum disease and heart disease has been
widely written about thanks to a study carried out in 2008 by both the University of
Bristol and the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin. The research teams
discovered that heart disease risk is greater in subjects who suffer from
bleeding gums because mouth bacteria more easily enters the bloodstream,
forming clots and therefore stymieing the flow of blood to the heart.
These are all interesting studies but we have to emphasise that some of the studies are very small and more work is required. Also, please remember that correlation is not the same as causation! See this article for further information on why gum disease is unlikely to cause heart disease.