Probiotics As A Dental Treatment? You Bet!

Probiotics are gaining popularity all over the world and are being endorsed by doctors as a scientifically valid treatment with health benefits. Their use is being expanded to a number of new fields and that includes dentistry. The question here is whether probiotics have matured enough to be considered a standalone therapy or whether their benefits are only adjunctive in nature.

What Are Probiotics?

The term probiotics means "for life". Probiotics are defined as live micro-organisms that confer a health benefit on the species which ingests them. The basic idea of using food to promote health has been around for centuries, and our ancestors actually used probiotic-rich food like yogurt for this purpose, albeit unknown to them. The idea behind their use is simple and has been proved scientifically. Our body is full of micro-organisms of many different strains and species, both beneficial and potentially harmful. 

By increasing the amount of health promoting micro-organisms and creating conditions favorable to their colonization, the disease causing micro-organisms are supposed to be suppressed. Excellent results have been seen with the use of probiotics in cases of antibiotic-associated diarrhea and fighting food allergies.

Prevention of Tooth Decay

Diet is one of the most important factors in dentistry, with the growth of organisms that produce decay being directly related to what you ear. Decay or caries is one of the most widespread dental diseases. Rotten teeth are caused by the action of the streptococcus species, which metabolize sugars in the diet to release acids which attack the surface of the teeth. 

The idea behind using probiotics is that the normal population of the micro-organisms in the mouth will shift towards a health-promoting ecosystem. Experimental studies conducted have shown a decrease in the number of streptococcus mutans species in the mouth in individuals who are taking probiotics, particularly those with the streptococcus salivarius M18 strain.

Periodontal Disease

Also referred to as "pyorrhea" or simply gum disease, this condition actually affects all the supporting structures around the teeth including the gums, the periodontal ligament and the bone. The disease is slow to progress and does not cause any pain. This is one of the main reasons why it is often ignored until it is too late to save the tooth. The cause of periodontal disease lies in a complex interplay of micro-organisms which exist in a bio film. This bio film forms as soon as it is removed and is impossible to prevent. Researchers are focusing on modifying the nature of this bio film through probiotic species which can dissolve the extra cellular matrix and reduce the number of inflammatory products being released from it.

READ Fighting Gum Disease With Yogurt

How Else Do Probiotics Benefit Dental Health?

Bad Breath

More than 90 percent of all cases of bad breath or halitosis are caused by the action of volatile sulfur compound producing micro-organisms. These organisms are present in everybody's mouth, however only flourish under conditions that favor them — such as those found in cases of poor oral hygiene, niches of food lodgment and decaying teeth. Studies have found that probiotic species such as streptococcus salivarius bring down the level of these volatile sulfur compounds producing micro-organisms and thus help in fighting bad breath.

Oral Thrush: Candidiasis

This is a condition seen primarily in people with compromised immunity. It is a fungal disease that causes the development of loosely attached white patches in the mouth. The basic mechanism behind its occurrence is that the body is unable to produce normal levels of antibodies that suppress this fungal growth and so it thrives unchecked. 

The use of probiotic species that grow in harmony with the body and even help prevent the growth of such opportunistic organisms has been investigated and found to have extremely positive results.

Questions That Remain Unanswered   

After going through the various areas in which probiotics have shown promise, along with their inherrant advantage of not causing antibiotic resistance and being completely natural, a natural question is why we aren't all using probiotics for everything all the time.

This is because some important questions remain unanswered. There is no clarity as to how long one must take probiotics for their effects to become permanent or stabilize, there is no consensus on what number of micro-organisms are necessary to see the optimum response, long-term studies on the subject are lacking although that can be attributed to the rapid growth of this field in a short time frame, and most importantly, the number of species that can be cultured and grown for use in probiotics remains abysmally small.

All of these issues are important and must be answered before probiotics can really be considered a reliable, predictable and stand-alone treatment option rather than just a supplement.

Things To Look For In The Future

Scientists who are proponents of the field belive probiotics may hold the key in a future where antibiotic resistance is a major problem. 

READ Is Your Ear Pain Really Caused By A Dental Problem?

After all, antibiotics kill harmful micro-organisms, while probiotics make the neighborhood uncomfortable enough for them that they have move away themselves. The end objective achieved is much the same. Current research in genetically modifying organisms to produce the metabolic products desired or to make them more persistent and more effective against pathogenic species could hold the key to the success of this field.

Combinations of probiotics species that could work as a team and influence the ecosystem being targeted is also one of the areas of research gaining momentum.

The unanswered questions will also have to be dealt with sooner rather than later for the medical community as a whole to get behind the idea of using probiotics as standard therapeutic option in the future.