The relationship between body mass index and periodontitis in the Copenhagen City Heart Study

Obesity is hypothesized to involve immunoinflammatory alterations, and the condition has been related to increased susceptibility to periodontitis. The present study analyzed the association between overweight/obesity and periodontitis assessed as clinical attachment loss (AL) and bleeding on probing (BOP) in a cross-sectional design.

Participants included 878 women and 719 men aged 20 to 95 years (participation rate 54%) who underwent an oral examination, including full-mouth recording of clinical AL and BOP. Overweight and obesity were assessed by body mass index (BMI) using the World Health Organization criteria. BMI was related to clinical AL (defined as mean > or =3 mm) and BOP (defined as > or =25%) by multivariable logistic regression in the total population and in subjects stratified by gender and smoking habits.

Obese participants had a lower odds ratio (OR) for clinical AL compared to participants with normal weight (OR: 0.60; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.36 to 0.99). The same tendency was observed in subjects stratified by smoking habit. Obese never-smokers had a lower OR for clinical AL compared to never-smoking participants with normal weight (OR: 0.32; 95% CI: 0.11 to 0.91). Overweight participants had a higher OR for BOP compared to subjects with normal weight (OR: 1.36; 95% CI: 1.04 to 1.78). In addition, overweight never-smokers had a higher OR for BOP compared to normal weight never-smokers (OR: 1.63; 95% CI: 1.03 to 2.59).

BMI may be inversely associated with clinical AL but positively related to BOP.