Mom's gum disease ups risk of premature birth

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Pregnant women with periodontal (gum) disease are at increased risk for delivering their infants prematurely, according to a pooled analysis of 17 studies involving 7,151 women, 1,056 of whom delivered their infants preterm or at a low birth weight.

Drs. Jean-Noel Vergnes and Michel Sixou of the Dental School in Toulouse, France found that mom's gum disease increased the risk of early birth or having a low birth weight infant nearly threefold.

For preterm birth alone, periodontal disease increased risk 2.27-fold, while it more than quadrupled the risk of having a low birth weight infant.

While the current study supports a periodontal disease-prematurity link, the authors say, the strength of the association they found should be interpreted with care, given that the higher quality studies they analyzed tended to show a weaker link.

It remains unclear how periodontal disease might contribute to preterm or low birth weight delivery, Vergnes and Sixou also point out in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

In an editorial accompanying the study, Dr. David M. Stamilo of the University of Pennsylvania Health System in Philadelphia and colleagues caution that while the meta-analysis is "comprehensive and well-executed," it cannot prove that gum disease causes preterm birth.

Studies investigating whether treating periodontal disease in pregnant women prevents preterm delivery have yielded conflicting results, they note. "Dental interventions cannot be recommended as preventive therapy for preterm birth based on the research currently available," they conclude. Good oral hygiene will lead to healthier gums and teeth, however.

SOURCE: American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology, February 2007.