Study: Poor Dental Health May Cause Brain Shrinkage

(CTN News) – Practicing poor Dental Health hygiene is not only liable to increase your chances of developing Dental Health cavities and gum disease, but it will also increase your chances of developing other health issues such as heart disease, cancer, and diabetes as well.

In a recent study by Japanese researchers, it has been found that poor dental health is linked to a decrease in brain volume, showing that the health of the mouth is directly related to the health of the brain.

Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan, has found that gum disease and tooth loss are related to shrinkage of the hippocampus, a region of the brain that is related to memory and Alzheimer’s disease.

In other words, does this mean that gum disease or tooth loss can lead to Alzheimer’s disease? This study doesn’t prove that, it simply shows that there is an association between the two.

Neurology, one of the medical journals published by the American Academy of Neurology, published a report on the study in an online issue of its journal, Neurology.

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The Tohoku University researchers felt that it was important to explore if tooth loss and gum disease, both of which are very common problems, may have something to do with dementia, an illness that affects millions of people worldwide.

This study did indeed find that tooth loss and gum disease were linked to shrinkage of the part of the brain that is responsible for controlling thinking and memory.

In order to conduct the study, the researchers conducted dental health exams, memory tests and brain scans on 172 participants (average age of 67) at the beginning of the study, as well as after four years in the study. There were no memory problems among the participants at the start of the study.

According to the researchers, they found a correlation between tooth loss and gum disease, as well as changes in the left hippocampus of the brain, when they compared the results at the beginning of the study and four years later.

It was found that people with mild gum Dental Health disease who had fewer teeth were more likely to experience brain shrinkage in the left hippocampus than those who had severe gum disease who had more teeth (equivalent to nearly a year of brain aging) or those who had severe gum disease who had more teeth (equivalent to 1.3 years of brain aging).

Satoshi Yamaguchi, the study’s author, noted that it was important to maintain a healthy mouth not just to retain the teeth, but also to preserve their health.

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