Always think about your oral health before vaping again
Our daily lifestyle has many aspects that give positive or negative effects on our bodies. We try to accommodate our habits to maintain balance in whatever we do be healthy.
As we know smoking is injurious for health and this awareness is quite high–especially when it comes to lung and heart health but there’s little or no knowledge about how badly it can affect your oral health. Even cigarette lovers shift to vaping thinking it’s less harmful.
Now we can say smoking impacts your gum and teeth health too. And if you thought that vaping has lesser health risks as compared to cigarettes, then you need to read this.
A recent study published in the journal iScience says vaping may alter different species of bacteria living in the mouth, making the user more prone to gum infections and inflammation.
The mouth harbors many microbial species–the microbiome that colonizes our respiratory and digestive tracts and raises the risk of gum disease by fostering an environment conducive for infection-causing bacteria to flourish.
This study co-author from New York University (NYU) in the US, said “Given the popularity of vaping, it is critical that we learn more about the effects of e-cigarette aerosols on the oral system and by this better understand the impact of vaping on human health,”
The researcher has gone through the in-depth study and also examined e-cigarette vapor and its influence inside the mouth, oral microbiome, and immune health. It also provides finding on how vaping affects the infection efficiency of oral pathogens in cell lines.
For this study the oral microbiome, the scientists recruited 119 participants from three groups: e-cigarette users, regular cigarette smokers, and those who had never smoked.
Gum disease was higher among cigarette smokers– and it was about 72.5%, followed by e-cigarette users at about 42.5% and non-smokers at 28.2%.
In this study, different microorganisms were found in the saliva of e-cigarette users, cigarette smokers, and non-smokers.
The researchers said e-cigarette users had an abundance of Porphyromonas bacteria–which causes an inflammatory disease that defaces the tissues supporting the tooth which can lead to tooth loss. While an increase in Veillonella bacteria-causing oral infections was found in both e-cigarette and cigarette users.
The scientists also found that according to the study, e-cigarette aerosols made cells prone to bacterial infection, pointing to a greater risk for infection in e-cigarette users and it was found that it influenced the local host immune environment compared to non-smokers and normal cigarette smokers
in the end, Saxena concluded with saying “This study finally suggests that vaping electronic cigarettes causes shifts in the oral environment and highly influences the colonization of complex microbial biofilms, which is harmful and raises the risk for oral inflammation and infection,”
So it’s better that you always think about your oral health before vaping again!