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Aren't good teeth just a proxy for wealth, healthy habits, good nutrition, and generally good health and wellbeing?
by iammjm 9mo ago
Aren't good teeth just a proxy for wealth, healthy habits, good nutrition, and generally good health and wellbeing?
- thomasingalls 9mo agoBad teeth also harbor bacteria that have been shown to exacerbate cardiovascular disease, at the very least. Not saying this article is claiming that as a casual mechanism, but diseased teeth are known to cause other systems to also become diseased.
- DANmode 9mo agoThe correlation is the other way around, in my mind: those that fall to acute infection, or indeed gut/systemic infection, will show poor oral hygiene, and both are implicated in diseases that shorten life expectancy.
- smt88 9mo agoThere's a known causal relationship between mouth bacteria and heart disease. It's thought that mouth bacteria cause systemic inflammation, which leads to the damage that causes heart disease. We'll likely find it also contributes to Alzheimer's (as, it seems, all pathogens and pollutants in the body seem to do).
- butlike 9mo agoIdk, my cat's vet measures the cats age based on the plaque on their teeth. Pretty sure my cat's not wealthy and has a tendency to over-eat.
- stubish 9mo agoMostly, yes. Also genetics, what bacteria happen to colonize your mouth and what types of food you ate while your jaw was developing. That changes nothing about the article though, that dental hygiene can be used to predict mortality and aged care demands.