Paying attention to your dental hygiene and health, especially your gum health. May not only pay you back with more than a nice, gleaming, healthy smile. It could help keep your heart healthy too!
It has long been debated between dentists and cardiologists the link between gum disease and heart disease. Here at Smile Essential dentist in Leicester we often see patients that could support the various theories surrounding the gum disease and heart disease link. While there are several theories, it is not clear whether gum disease actually has a direct link to heart disease or not. If it’s true that people with poor oral health have more heart attacks, it doesn’t necessarily mean that poor oral health causes them. People with good oral hygiene may just be taking better care of themselves. In other words, people who floss and brush their teeth may have healthier life style and other heart-healthy habits.
How Could they be linked?
Experts agree that there are plausible reasons why dental health and heart health may be linked. For example, inflammation is a common problem in both diseases. Narrowing of the arteries or atherosclerosis, is associated with inflammation. Much of the build up of fatty plaque, also called atheroma (not the same as plaque we find on the teeth) in the arteries is an inflammatory process. Inflammation is also associated with gum disease. Gingivitis (the early stages of gum disease) occurs when gums become inflamed and bacteria invade the tissues.
What research shows about gum disease and the heart-
Experts in periodontology and cardiology reviewed more than 120 published medical studies, position papers and other data on the heart and a possible dental health link. They developed a consensus report, published in 2009 simultaneously in the Journal of Periodontology and the American Journal of Cardiology.
The aim of the paper was to give cardiologists, periodontists and other health professionals a better understanding of the links between gum disease and heart disease. But overall research is still ongoing and more is needed to know for sure.