According to preliminary research to be presented at the American Stroke Association’s 2023 International Stroke Conference, taking care of your teeth and gums may have benefits beyond oral health, such as increased brain function.
Studies have shown, according totimesnownewsGum disease, missing teeth, and other signs of poor oral health, along with poor dental cleaning habits and lack of plaque removal, increase the risk of stroke. According to the American Stroke Association, stroke is the fifth leading cause of death and leading cause of disability in the United States. .
Previous research has also found that gum disease and other oral health concerns are associated with risk factors for heart disease and other conditions such as high blood pressure.
What has not been clear is whether poor oral health affects brain health, i.e. the functional state of the brain, said study author Cibrian Riviere, MD, MA, postdoctoral fellow in neuroscience at Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut. person, which we can now better understand using neuroimaging tools such as magnetic resonance imaging or magnetic resonance imaging.”
Just as healthy lifestyle choices affect the risk of heart disease and stroke, they also affect brain health, which includes an individual’s ability to remember things, think clearly, and function in life. Three out of five people in the United States will develop brain disease in their lifetime, according to the latest Estimates from the American Stroke Association, a division of the American Heart Association.
Between 2014 and 2021, the researchers in this study analyzed the potential link between oral health and brain health among nearly 40,000 adults (46% men, average age 57) without a history of stroke enrolled in the UK Biobank. Participants were screened for 105 genetic variants known to predispose people to cavities, dentures, and tooth loss later in life, and the relationship between the burden of these genetic risk factors for poor oral health and brain health was assessed.
Signs of poor brain health were examined through MRI images of the participants’ brains: white matter hyperdensity, which is defined as accumulated damage to the brain’s white matter, which can impair memory, balance, and movement; and microstructural damage, which is the degree to which the microstructure of the brain has changed compared to images of a normal brain scan of a healthy adult of the same age.
The analysis found that people who are genetically predisposed to decay, missing teeth or needing dentures had a higher burden of silent cerebrovascular disease, which is represented by a 24% increase in the number of white matter hyperdensities visible on MRI images..
Those with genetically poor oral health had increased damage to the microstructure of the brain, as represented by a 43% change in the scores of microstructural damage visible on MRI scans. The microstructural damage scores are whole-brain summaries of microstructural damage to each brain region.
“Poor oral health may cause deterioration in brain health, so we need to be more careful about our oral hygiene because it has effects that extend far beyond the mouth,” Rivière said. However, this study is preliminary, and more evidence needs to be collected – ideally through clinical trials – to confirm that improving oral health in the population will lead to brain health benefits..”