La Jolla Center for Holistic Dentistry
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Poor
Oral Health May Be Related to Memory Loss
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Dear fen-hui,
Many people lose teeth as they become older, and many people lose some memory capacity as they grow older. Could these two problems be related? To find out, researchers are exploring the possible links between oral health and memory loss.
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Oral Systematic Connection
Oral health researchers have found that tooth and gum disease have links to many other health problems - from heart disease, lung disease, diabetes to premature birth and pregnancy complications. Now they think there might be links to memory loss.
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Memory Loss and Messy Mouth 
Many dentists see memory loss in older patients who come into their
offices with teeth that are
a mess. Often that's because these patients have forgotten to do the basics of self care.
If somebody has dementia or they have Alzheimer's, they most likely could forget to brush or floss their teeth. That would not be new, but what surprised us was the linkage between mild to moderate memory loss and oral disease.
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 NHANES Findings
Richard Crout researches gum disease at the University of West Virginia School of Dentistry. Crout and his students examined data from NHANES [National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey], a national survey of Americans, which asked them about their health. Subjects in the study also had dentalexams. And the data showed that people who reported tooth and gum disease had lower scores on tests that measured memory and cognition. One hypothesis that would link oral disease and memory loss relies on new evidence about how tissue inflammation affects the brain. "The hypothesis is that there are
inflammatory byproducts that come from the infection in our mouths, particularly with the more advanced form of gum disease, " Crout says. "And these byproducts can then travel to areas of the brain that have noted to be related to memory loss."
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Memory Loss or Diseases in The Mouth First
But he says it can be hard to
determine which problem comes first - memory loss or diseases in the mouth. To fnd
out, Crout says he will need to study patients over a long period of time,
watching for both periodontal disease and memory loss. He recently received a
large grant from the U.S. National Institutes of Health to pursue this line of
investigation.
"We would certain sets of
patients, have their baseline inflammatory markers in the blood. In other
words, we would know the levels of these different levels of toxins,"
Crout says.
"We then have their dental
examinations and their periodontal examinations done, and we then have their
memory tests done. And next we would perform an intervention."
An intervention could be, for
example, to give some patients an electric toothbrush that helps them care for
their mouths better, while other patients just get a regular toothbrush. Crout
says "Then we would watch over time and measure what is happening to these
patients' ability to remember."
He says it might take many years
before he gets an answer to his hypothesis.
Disregarding which problem comes first oral health is closely link to many health problems. Maintaining optimal oral health is truly vital to our health.
Abstract of earlier study by Richard
Crout
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La Jolla Center for
Holistic Dentistry
www.toxinfreesmile.com
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We appreciate your trust in us. Please feel free to call us for any question you may have. We look forward to your next visit.
Sincerely,
Fen-Hui Chen DDS and Staff
La Jolla Center for Holistic Dentistry
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