This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citing articles on Web of Science (3)  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in JAMA  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Charles Marwick

JAMA. 2000;283:2922.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

Washington—Periodontal disease in mothers is an independent risk factor for premature birth. Treating the condition may help reduce the number of premature deliveries, said Marjorie K. Jeffcoat, DMD, chair of the Department of Periodontics at the University of Alabama School of Dentistry. She spoke at a press conference during the annual meeting of the American Association for Dental Research.

In a case control study of mothers who delivered preterm infants matched with mothers who delivered normal-term infants—and controlled for such factors as ethnicity, occupation or socioeconomic status, alcohol intake, smoking, and age—preterm deliveries were three times more common in women with periodontal disease than in those with good oral health (Compendium. In press).

The biological mechanism is still being studied,but it has been shown that periodontal infections in animals impair fetal growth. This impaired growth is believed to be due to the enhanced release of cytokines, . . . [Full Text of this Article]

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?