Asthma Not Linked to Tooth Decay

Asthma Not Linked to Tooth Decay

Contrary to what you may have heard before, there’s no link between asthma and tooth decay in children, according to a study that appeared in the September issue of the Journal of the American Dental Association.

The findings challenge some previous research suggesting that children with asthma may be more likely to develop cavities. These studies had suggested that children who use nebulizers to control their asthma may inadvertently increase their frequency of exposure to sugars because these nebulizers use fructose to deliver therapy. This increased frequency and amount of certain sugars consumed are major factors leading to cavities

For the new study, researchers analyzed 27 studies in papers published between 1976 and March 2010.

“We found little evidence to suggest that asthma causes tooth decay. In fact, the two largest studies we reviewed found that children with asthma appear to have fewer cavities than others. This may be because their parents are used to taking them to health-care providers, and routinely bring them to the dentist,” study author Gerardo Maupome, a professor of preventive and community dentistry at the Indiana University School of Dentistry, said in a university news release.

“The notion that there is a link between asthma and tooth decay may have its origin in anecdotal statements by emergency room workers who see children with poorly managed asthma. These children could also be more likely to have poorly managed dental conditions, and therefore tooth decay,” Maupome said. “It’s reasonable to believe that poor clinical management may be associated with both conditions, not the asthma that is causing the cavities.”

While not apparently associated, tooth decay and asthma are the two most prevalent chronic childhood diseases in the United States.

Study Finds Hormones, Number of Pregnancies Affects Women’s Risk of Caries

Study Finds Hormones, Number of Pregnancies Affects Women’s Risk of Caries

Dr. John Lukacs, Ph.D., a professor of anthropology at the University of Oregon, believes that he has found the reason that women tend to have more cavities than men, and why some women tend to have more cavities than others.

According to Lukac, male and female children seem to have a similar number of caries. The numbers start to change, however, as children become adolescents because of the dramatic increase of estrogen in females as they mature.

Women become even more prone to caries throughout their childbearing years, particularly during times of pregnancy, which are, coincidentally, times of increased estrogen production. In fact, women’s estrogen levels increase steadily during pregnancy until birth.  

According to Lukacs, females produce less saliva than men. Saliva has two important components: enzymes that break down complex sugars in the mouth, and antibodies that attack the microbes responsible for cavities. Having less saliva, then, puts women at a much greater risk for developing cavities.

In addition, it appears women’s saliva has less of an antimicrobial effect when they are pregnant.

To add insult to injury, women often crave sugary, high-energy, high-carbohydrate foods during pregnancy, so when they eat these foods, their saliva has less of a protecting effect, and their teeth are already at risk from the increased estrogen.

“The role of female-specific factors has been denied by anthropologists, yet they attain considerable importance in the model proposed here, because the adoption of agriculture is associated with increased sedentism and fertility,” Lukacs concluded in the October 2008 issue of Current Anthropology. “I argue that the rise of agriculture increased demands on women’s reproductive systems, contributing to an increase in fertility that intensified the negative impact of dietary change on women’s oral health. The combined impacts of increased fertility, dietary changes and division of labor during the move into agricultural societies contributed to the widespread gender differential observed in dental caries rates today… If hormonal and physiological factors work in an independent or additive manner, their impact on women’s oral health could be significant. The fact that women’s caries experience increases with age at a greater rate than men’s in diverse ethnic groups from different ecological and cultural settings supports this interpretation.”

Study Links Periodontal Disease, Cognition

Tooth Loss, Cavities, Gingivitis, Periodontal Disease All Linked to Lower Process of Thought

Study Links Periodontal Disease, Cognition

Researchers at Boston University Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine (GSDM) released a definitive link between tooth loss/periodontal disease to cognitive decline in one of the largest and longest prospective studies on the topic to date, released in this month’s issue of the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.

In what could be called ground-breaking research in the fields of dementia and Alzheimer’s, Dr. Elizabeth Krall Kaye looked for patterns in dental records from 1970 to 1973 to determine if periodontal disease and tooth loss predicted whether people did well or poorly on cognitive tests. She found that for each tooth lost per decade, the risk of doing poorly increased approximately eight to 10 percent.

More cavities usually meant lower cognition – or the process of thought – too. People with no tooth loss tended to do better on the tests.

Dr. Kaye suggests that doctors whose patients are testing poorly for cognitive standards may want to consider dental health. “The findings should also give dentists yet another reason to prevent tooth loss and periodontal disease and encourage patients to do as much as they can to prevent dental disease,” she explained.

With both periodontal disease and dementia/Alzheimer’s incidence rising sharply as Baby Boomers age, these findings could change the future of the hundreds of thousands of people predicted to develop Alzheimer’s and dementia in the next several decades.