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Black men who neglect teeth at greater health risk
29th Sep 2009
A new study claims that black men are more likely to suffer serious consequences to their overall health if they neglect their teeth than any other gender or race.
The US report, published in the Journal of Dental Research, found differences in response to dental plaque in 128 black and white healthy subjects of both genders who had shown no evidence of periodontal disease, but were asked to forego brushing their teeth.
The research team, led by Michael Kowolik of the Indiana University School of Dentistry on the campus of Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, found that dental plaque accumulation did not result in a change in total white blood count, a known risk factor for adverse cardiac events.
However, in black males the researchers noted a significant increase in the activity of neutrophils, the most common type of white blood cell – and an essential part of the immune system.
Dr Kowolik said: ‘We are talking about healthy people who simply neglect oral hygiene and if they were male and black, we found a response from their white blood cells, or neutrophils, that might be a cause for concern.
‘If you get a bacterial infection anywhere in the body, billions of neutrophils come flooding out of your bone marrow to defend against the intruder. Our observation that with poor dental hygiene white blood cell activity increased in black men, but not black women or whites of either sex, suggests both gender and racial differences in the inflammatory response to dental plaque.
‘This finding could help us identify individuals at greater risk from infections anywhere in the body including those affecting the heart.'
‘While we did not observe higher white blood cell counts as the result of dental plaque accumulation, the increased activity of white blood cells, which we did find, may also carry a higher risk for heart disease,' he added.
Neutrophil Response to Dental Plaque by Gender and Race appears in the August 2009 issue of the Journal of Dental Research and adds to the body of evidence that dental hygiene plays an important role in a preventive health program for the whole body.
Other authors of the study, which was supported by a grant from the National Institutes of Health, are Vivian Y. Wahaidi, B.D.S. of the IU School of Dentistry; Sheri A. Dowsett, B.Ch.D., Ph.D. of Eli Lilly and Company and the IU School of Dentistry; and George J. Eckert, M.A.S. of the Division of Biostatistics of the IU School of Medicine.
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