Does replacing missing teeth lower Alzheimer's risk?

Last week, I discussed the relationship between poor oral health, such as inadequate teeth brushing, and the increased risk of developing dementia, including Alzheimer's disease. (link: Periodontal bacteria in the brain-Implication for Alzheimer's disease: A systematic review - PubMed (nih.gov))

But what about the benefit of teeth replacement? Does it lower your risk of developing Alzheimer's?

This new study examined just that, i.e., whether replacements for missing teeth lower the risk of cognitive decline.

It was presented at the 52nd Annual Meeting & Exhibition of the American Association for Dental, Oral, and Craniofacial Research (AADOCR) in conjunction with the 47th Annual Meeting of the Canadian Association for Dental Research (CADR) by Elizabeth Kaye of Boston University, March 15-18, 2023

Study conducted by: Elizabeth Kaye, Boston University

Sample: 577 men from the VA Normative Aging Study (NAS) and Dental Longitudinal Study

Methodology: Tooth status and type of replacement, if any, were recorded during triennial dental exams from 1969 to 2001. Masticatory efficiency was assessed using carrot chewing tests. The Spatial Copying Task (SCT) was administered up to four times between 1995 and 2001. Poor cognition was defined as any weighted SCT score <13 (lowest tertile of initial SCT scores in all NAS participants). Tooth-level Cox proportional regression was employed, accounting for clustering within individuals and adjusting for education, epilepsy medication use, and time-varying values of tooth status (present, absent, fixed bridge/implant, removable replacement), age, cigarette smoking, and coronary heart disease.

Results: The mean age at initial cognitive testing was 68±7 years. Forty-five percent of men had at least one low SCT score. Twenty-nine percent of participants lost no teeth during follow-up, 34% lost teeth that were not replaced, 13% had missing teeth subsequently replaced with fixed prostheses, and 25% had missing teeth replaced with removable prostheses. New fixed prostheses were associated with a lower hazard (HR=0.72, 95%CI=0.52-0.99) of poor cognition, while new removable prostheses were associated with a higher hazard (HR=1.26, 95% CI=1.01-1.56). Loss of a tooth with no replacement was not associated with a significantly higher hazard (HR=1.05 95% CI=0.91-1.21) of poor cognition. Masticatory ability declined 6% in men with new fixed prostheses compared to 9%, 10%, and 13% in men with no tooth loss, new removable prostheses, and tooth loss but no replacement, respectively.

Conclusion: The study found that replacing missing teeth with fixed prostheses may protect against cognitive decline, and the conservation of masticatory ability could play a role in this protective association. The results suggest that dental interventions using fixed prostheses could potentially contribute to maintaining cognitive function in older adults.

#oralhealth #alzheimers #dementia #microbiome #healthnews