Diabetes and Your Oral Health

What is Diabetes?

Type 2 diabetes is the most common type of diabetes. Those with type 2 diabetes have insulin resistance, in which their bodies do not use insulin properly. Though their bodies try to produce extra insulin to make up for the deficiency, over time they are not able to keep up and cannot regulate their insulin levels. Insulin is a hormone made by the pancreas that allows your body to use sugar (glucose) from carbohydrates in the food that you eat for energy or to store glucose for future use. Insulin helps keeps your blood sugar level from getting too high (hyperglycemia) or too low (hypoglycemia).

How Does Diabetes Affect Oral Health?

Diabetes affects your mouth in a few ways:

1. Diabetes weakens the gums. If there’s too much glucose in a person’s system, blood vessels can’t function properly. Since your mouth has millions of bacteria in it, those with diabetes can’t properly fight the bacteria, thus the gums will weaken and develop disease faster.
2. Diabetes can lead to periodontal disease. Because blood vessels are impaired, the flow of nutrients and removal of body wastes are impaired and this will weaken the gums and bone making them more susceptible to infection; those with diabetes are at higher risk for periodontal disease.

In short, if you have elevated levels of sugar, the bacteria in your mouth will thrive on that and begin to breakdown the teeth and gums more quickly.

What We Do to Help Patients with Diabetes

Our dentists are experienced in helping patients with diabetes. They might recommend additional cleanings, and will also teach you how to brush and how to floss properly to make sure you’re reducing the levels of bacteria in your mouth as much as possible. So, in addition to the extra cleanings every year, we want to give you the tools you need to help keep your mouth healthy all the time.

Evidence-Based Integrated Care Plans

We want to make sure that we help patients with diabetes have the best oral health possible. That’s why we could offer you evidence-based integrated care plans. With an understanding of the science and relationship between diabetes and periodontal disease, we can help you better maintain your oral health, better control your diabetes, and overall general health.

Overall, we know that if we can improve your oral health, we can help control your diabetes as well.

Ensuring good oral health starts with recognizing that there is a strong connection between the body and mouth. Having diabetes and ensuring good oral health is a two-way street: your periodontal health can affect your diabetes, and your diabetes can affect your periodontal health. As a patient of Dental clinic Petar Duchev, your provider will pay very close attention to your medical history to ensure that we’re giving you the best care possible related to any systemic issues you have.