New Study Reveals Link Between Gum And Heart Disease
Comments (0) 
In a recently released study, Scientists from the University of Kiel, Germany have found a genetic link between dental disease and coronary heart disease (CHD).
Dr Arne Schaefer, of the Institute for Clinical Molecular Biology at the University of Kiel, and colleagues were responsible for this revolutionary breakthrough. Schaefer presented their findings to the annual conference of the European Society of Human Genetics in Vienna on Monday 25 May.
“We found that the genetic risk variant is located in a genetic region that codes for an antisense DNA called ANRIL”, said Dr. Schaefer, “and that it is identical for both diseases.”
“We studied a genetic locus on chromosome 9p21.3 that had previously been identified to be associated with myocardial infarction, in a group of 151 patients suffering from the most aggressive, early-onset forms of periodontitis, and a group of 1097 CHD patients who had already had a heart attack,” he said.
Doctors have known for a long time that periodontitis and coronary heart disease frequently go together, however this is the first time someone has presented evidence supporting the idea that they both come from the same causes.
Gum disease – or periodontitis – can be a path into the bloodstream for approximately 700 cases of bacteria found in the mouth, leading to the more serious problem of coronary heart disease.
Coronary heart disease is the world leading cause of death, and periodontitis, which leads to the connective tissue and the bone support of teeth, is the primary cause of tooth loss in adults over the age of 40. The tooth disease affects 90 percent of people over 60 years old.
Themocracy