The Link Between High Fat Diets And Gum Disease

Sometimes, when it comes to diet and health you get the sense that you just can’t win. The link between high fat diets and gum disease could be fuel for that particular fire. Studies have revealed that high fat low carb diets produce worse outcomes in terms of conditions like periodontitis or gum disease. Many of us have turned to these new diets in response to our sedentary lifestyles, where carbohydrate consumption is a calorie overkill. We have been eating less bread, pasta, and processed foods filled with carbs in a bid to maintain a healthier and better figure.

Digging Deeper Into High Fat Diets & Periodontitis

We have been eating healthy high fat foods like avocado, seeds, eggs, coconut, fatty fish, yoghurt, dark chocolate, nuts, tofu, and cheese. These are experienced as more filling by the body and make us less inclined to snack out of meal times. The study, which is reproduced in the Journal of Clinical Periodontology and titled “Untargeted and Targeted Gingival Metabolome in Rodents Reveal Metabolic Links Between High-Fat- Diet-Induced Obesity and Periodontitis”. Try saying that in a hurry. One wonders how biologically relevant mice are to the human condition, but these scientists do tend to perform a lot of studies on our rodent cohabiters of this earth. The study outcome points the finger at obesity, as bad for gum disease and that a high fat diet makes things worse. The amplified metabolic result from consumption of high fat foods dramatically worsened periodontitis in the mice. 

“Based on their findings, the team of scientists discovered that the mice with periodontitis that were fed a high-fat diet revealed a much greater impact on their metabolism and periodontal disease than the control group. The results revealed that both periodontitis and a high-fat diet had distinct effects on the animal’s gingival metabolome.”

Obesity & Our Diet

Obesity is a major scourge of our modern lifestyles and diets. We live in large cities, where many of us spend inordinate amounts of time seated behind screens, desks, TVs, steering wheels, and such like. We eat too much full stop. We do not get enough exercise. Our physiologies evolved over millions of years, of which the greater part we were swinging through trees, running, and moving about a lot. Our diets were big on grass seeds, like rice, wheat, barley, and the many other grains we could access. It is, therefore, most plausible that our teeth and gums have evolved to be best served by the consumption and processing of such raw carbohydrates. This, then, sets up a paradoxical situation for our biological realities. The big brained monkeys, Homo sapiens, are attempting to adjust their dietary intakes to meet the challenges of their sedentary lifestyles but their teeth are very old tech.

A balanced lifestyle in terms of getting enough exercise is the most important takeaway from this study, in my view. If you are overweight, obese perhaps, then, a high fat diet is not the best way to go. Indeed, in terms of issues like gum disease it is advisable for you to be extra vigilant about how you take care of your oral hygiene. Make sure that you are seeing your dentist regularly, at least twice a year or more. Ensure that you are brushing and flossing your teeth several times per day. Gum disease may be served by flushing with a recommended mouth wash if so recommended by your dentist. Obesity puts you at greater risk from a wide variety of serious health conditions. Managing your obesity is first and foremost the best thing that you can do. Get more exercise and reduce your levels of inactivity in consultation with your doctor. Talk to your dentist about the optimal diet for you.

Diets & Their Dangers For All Of Us

Eating the same things all the time for prolonged periods of time is not good for our health. Therefore, commitments to high fat low carb diets are not advisable for long stretches of time. A varied diet containing fresh unprocessed foods is recommended by most nutritionists. Combining this with regular exercise will produce the best outcomes for your health. It is very easy to get caught up in an isolated view of diet based on weight loss. This can miss the big picture and the heightened risk of gum disease may well be a wakeup call for some on these diets. Our diets need to be responsive to our circumstances and lifestyles – not locked into a fanatical fad. The actual meaning of the word ‘diet’ from the Greek is ‘way of life’.

The results of this study, which shows the link between high fat diets and gum disease are relevant for all of us, no matter our weight. We are being made aware of the needs of our teeth and gums in terms of our dietary intake. Our teeth are very valuable and once they are gone, the alternatives are not particularly great. Taking care of our teeth and gums is as important as our waist line, and we would do well to remember this before it is too late.

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Note: All content and media on the  Sunbury Dental House website and social media channels are created and published online for informational purposes only. It is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice and should not be relied on as health or personal advice.

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