By: Dr. Chris Kammer

OK, this isn’t as fun and sexy to talk about as cosmetic dentistry but it’s time to sound the alarm on one of the most common diseases around. It’s GUM DISEASE folks and 75% of Americans have some stage of it.

 Sadly, most people think that it’s normal when gums bleed. Well it’s not! If you washed your hands and they started to bleed, wouldn’t you get a little worried? Of course you would, yet most people don’t get worried about bleeding gums because no one is telling them it is serious gum disease that could be deadly!!Well I am moved to start broadcasting this message far and wide and I’m also ready to do some serious intellectual battling with anyone that tells you something different.

The New England Journal of Medicine has reported that inflammation like you find in gum disease causes the liver to produce C- Reactive Protein which is a better indicator of future heart attack and stroke than cholesterol. Think of all the fuss we’ve heard about cholesterol over the years and now imagine a heightened concern that actually causes people to return to the dentist. It now should be standard protocol for physicians to send their stroke and heart risk patients straight to the dentist to get their gum disease under control as their first line of defense.

And there’s more. Did you know that dentists play a role in identifying the 5 million Americans with undiagnosed diabetes? This is because diabetics are more susceptible to gum disease and that can cause their mortality rate to rise by a factor of 7.5. Patients that don’t respond to our best efforts to get their hygiene under control may have undiagnosed diabetes. Patient with diabetes must keep their gum health pristine to increase their chances of survival.

And there’s still more. According to Time magazine last week,University of Southern California researchers have reported that gum disease inflammation can quadruple the risk of developing Alzheimer’s Disease and that treating the inflammation could help stave off the disease.

Still more. The Journal of Periodontology (oral gums and bone) showed that pregnant women with high levels of bacteria in their mouth are at high risk for delivering preterm low-weight babies. Doctors believe that the bacteria from the mouth travels to the uterus and interferes with the pregnancy.

And finally…we have always known thet gum infections of the mouth can spread to other parts of the body like the heart and even the brain! The news about gum disease and it’s connection to our overall health continues to come up again and again in research and medicine. It’s time to get deadly serious about the disease that most of the planet still does not take seriously.

Here’s the good news! In our office we have the systems and technology to get gum disease under control 98% of the time without specialist surgery.  

 www.drdomo.com