Speakers

Biography

Daniela Torrealba Garcia Studied dentistry at the University CEU-Cardenal Herrera (Valencia, Spain, 2019) and got her master’s degree in Hospital dentistry and special needs patients from the University of Valencia (Spain, Dec 2020). Has followed several courses, including how to avoid cross-contamination/infection in the dental clinic and the effects of mouth bacteria in other diseases. Presented a poster in 2021 in the International Alzheimer Association and has given seminars and courses to parents, children, and education students about how best to take care of the mouth and its effect on the rest of the body. She is currently working in a pediatric dental clinic in the Netherlands. 

Abstract

Background
Alzheimer’s disease is a neurodegenerative disease with an unknown cause, being the first cause of dementia affecting 24 million people, which is set to double by 2040. Periodontitis is a multifactorial, inflammatory, and chronic disease that causes the loss of the tooth’s support system, the number one cause of tooth loss in adults. Both diseases are highly prevalent, making them a significant public health issue. New studies have shown that there might be a relationship between them.
Method
A systematic review and comparative analysis of studies through a bibliographic search included clinical trials, case-control, and cohort studies in humans, with objective tests for diagnosing both diseases. Excluding descriptive studies or studies that didn’t focus on Alzheimer’s, studies that didn’t diagnose periodontitis clinically, single case studies based on patients with syndromes, or evaluated exclusively the patients' quality of life. From the 473 articles found, only 9 fulfilled the inclusion and exclusion criteria.
Result
Out of the nine articles selected, 7 found a statistically significant difference between people with Alzheimer’s and those without it periodontitis (Choi S et al., Ide M et al., de Suza T et al., Martande SS et al., Holmer J et al., Cestari JA at al, Aragón F et al.). Chen CK et al. didn’t find a statistical significance at the beginning (p=0.0547) but did in the 10-year follow-up (p=0.00264). Tiisanoja A et al. found no statistical significance (RR=1.54; IC=0.52-4.56). However, when subjecting the article’s results to CI for the proportion analysis, we discovered that only one study found this difference significant out of the six included.
Conclusion
The most common oral problems in patients with Alzheimer’s were gingivitis, periodontitis, tooth loss, candidiasis, and calculus. Although there seems to be a relationship between the two, further studies with larger populations and a better screening process for participants are needed to truly assess whether there is a causal relationship between the two pathologies. One of the most significant limitations we encountered was the lack of homogeneity between the studies' statistical tools, making it impossible to do a meta-analysis.

Keywords: Alzheimer's, Alzheimer’s disease, Periodontitis, Periodontal bacteria.