Health

Why you should have a mouth MOT before you have an operation

Reduce the inflammation in your body by ensuring your teeth, gums and jaw bones are healthy, says Lucy Stock of Gentle Dental Care

Research has started piling up showing that chronic gum disease is linked to cancer
Research has started piling up showing that chronic gum disease is linked to cancer Research has started piling up showing that chronic gum disease is linked to cancer

"Why don't more specialities ask for a clean bill of mouth health before the patient has an operation?" I asked my cardiologist patient last week.

Normally we get letters from orthopaedics and cardiology requesting the dentist to carry out an oral MOT on their patient.

This is to ensure the patient has no lurking infections before a new hip or heart valve is placed because mouth bugs can travel to artificial devices and cause them to fail.

Every day I clean heaps of infection out from around gums, inside teeth and deep within jaw bones. Infection looks like spongy blobs and contains all sorts of nasties that are microscopically whipping up biological hurricanes inside people's mouths.

These storms of inflammation tornado all around the body setting off an infinite number of cellular domino events ending in all manners of unsavoury diseases.

Research has started piling up showing that chronic gum disease is linked to different cancers such as stomach, colon, lung, bladder, thyroid, breast and leukaemia.

Research from Harvard looked at 150,000 men and women and followed them for 28 years. It found that those with a history of advanced gum disease were 43 per cent more likely to develop oesophageal (food pipe) cancer, 52 per cent more likely to develop stomach cancer and 59 per cent more at risk of oesophageal cancer.

So, after cleaning out oral inflammation lesions, I feel great as I know that not only is the patient's mouth healthier but also their entire body system is throwing a fiesta because one source of inflammation has been eliminated.

Our inflammatory response is actually a normal reaction ready for action when the body's defences are breached due to trauma or bacteria and viruses. The troubles come when the inflammatory response switch doesn't turn off – in effect its stuck at on. Our bodily organs become overloaded by chronic inflammation and that's when our body stops working properly and we get sick.

Of course, it's understandable that more patients don't attend the dentist before embarking on medical treatment as it's only the dentists who see all the infection skulking inside people's mouths but it still needs addressed.