Link between Periodontitis and Diabetes and Obesity
A researcher at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry has received a two-year federal grant totalling $432,000, to continue a study concerning the relationship between periodontitis and type 2 diabetes and obesity. Dr. Keiko Watanabe, in a study published in the J. of Periodontology (July, 2008), showed that periodontitis accelerated the inception of insulin resistance in rats fed a high-fat diet. The new study will investigate how periodontitis affects related-diabetic complications, such as the pancreas, retina and aorta. Although this association between obesity and type 2 diabetes and periodontitis has been recognized for some time, the causes are still poorly understood. Dr. Watanabe hopes that her new study will find the reasons why periodontitis can affect type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance, as well as damage organ. This way clinicians may better monitor those individuals at danger of developing the disease in the future. The researchers are hopeful of developing a plan to treat periodontitis, in order that insulin resistance will not hasten the onset of type 2 diabetes.
One main challenge by researchers is to prove causality between periodontitis and obesity and type 2 diabetes. The published reports are loaded with epidemiological or cross-sectional studies, and do not prove causality. Dr. Watanabe will be using female diabetic fatty rats for her animal model, as these rats more closely resemble humans that eat a high-fat diet and consequently develop insulin resistance and type 2 diabetes. Several published reports have shown that when periodontitis is treated in type 2 diabetic humans, there was significant improvement in glycemic control. However, in human studies, covariates need to be controlled for in order to make a comparation. This isn’t necessary in animal studies.
