If you had to choose which parts of your body you should take care of first to ensure good health, it’s likely that your heart, brain, or lungs would make the list, but not your mouth. However, there is plenty of evidence that our oral hygiene can affect the health of our entire body.
To begin with, bacteria that infect our gums can release harmful substances that travel through the bloodstream and reach various organs such as the heart and blood vessels, causing cardiovascular disease. These bacteria can also reach our joints and cause inflammation, causing arthritis. Additionally, oral infections can alter blood sugar levels, increasing the risk of diabetes.
On the other hand, we also know that good general health helps maintain oral health. For example, people with diabetes have higher levels of substances that cause inflammation in the body, leading to a higher risk of tooth decay and gum disease. At the same time, people with good cardiovascular health seem to have a lower risk of oral infections.
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Another factor that affects oral health has recently been identified: adipose tissue, or the fat mass of our bodies. In particular, it has been noted that obese people have a higher risk of developing periodontitis, a disease that involves chronic inflammation of the gums and tissues that support the teeth. What’s worse, periodontitis usually heals more slowly in obese patients.
Be careful with adipokines
But why? The most well-known functions of fat tissue are storing energy and regulating body temperature. However, today we know that the cells that make up fat tissue, known as adipocytes, also secrete a variety of substances that affect various organs in the body, such as blood vessels, kidneys, joints, and even the gums themselves.
These substances include adipokines, a group of proteins that participate in the body’s inflammatory and protective processes. The two most well-known of these are leptin and adiponectin. The former, which is also responsible for feelings of hunger and satiety, activates the production of inflammatory substances. On the other hand, adiponectin has the opposite effect: it is considered an anti-inflammatory protein.
Elevated blood levels of leptin have been found to increase the risk of developing periodontitis, which causes chronic inflammation of the gums, making it difficult for them to heal, and causing loss of jaw bone in severe cases. In fact, leptin levels decrease as periodontitis heals.
In contrast, people with chronic periodontitis have decreased adiponectin levels. Moreover, administration of adiponectin promotes healing of periodontitis by reducing the production of inflammatory substances and promoting the creation of new tissue and blood vessels.
So, obesity is not only an increase in the thickness of our fat tissue in different areas of the body, but it also affects the health of our adipocytes, which produce excess leptin while reducing the release of adiponectin. This leads to gum inflammation, which can trigger periodontitis, especially if it is not accompanied by proper oral hygiene.
In addition to obesity, fatty tissue disease occurs with other chronic conditions that cause persistent inflammation in the body, such as severe cases of diabetes, heart disease, or kidney disease. In all these situations, it is extremely important to maintain good oral hygiene and visit the dentist regularly, as there is an increased risk of oral infections.