EFP Manifesto highlights links between gum health and general health

The EFP Manifesto “Perio and General Health" is a call to action for the prevention, early detection, and treatment of periodontitis.

Based on the conclusions of the IX European Workshop in Periodontology, held in 2012, the Manifesto was the first formal declaration in international dentistry to condense years of research into the links between periodontal disease and systemic illnesses into an acknowledgement of periodontitis as a major public-health issue.

On cardiovascular disease, the manifesto notes the evidence for an association between cardiovascular diseases and periodontitis:

• Plausibility – Periodontitis leads to entry of bacteria into the blood stream. The bacteria activate the host’s inflammatory-immune response by multiple mechanisms. Several animal models have demonstrated that the host’s inflammatory response favours atheroma formation, maturation, and exacerbation.
• Epidemiological data. There is consistent epidemiological evidence that periodontitis imparts increased risk for future cardiovascular disease, independently of other confounding factors.
• Intervention studies. There is moderate evidence that periodontal treatment reduces systemic inflammation as evidenced by reductions in C-reactive protein (CRP) and oxidative stress, and leads to improvements of surrogate clinical and biochemical measures of vascular endothelial function.

The EFP Manifesto also covers the links between periodontitis and diabetes, adverse pregnancy outcomes, and other diseases.

The EFP invites individuals, companies. and institutions involved in health care, to sign the manifesto and thereby support a mission to bring benefits from periodontal care to the general health of individuals and society.

VIEW AND SIGN THE MANIFESTO