Higher Prevalence of Tooth Loss in People With Abdominal Obesity but Normal Weight: Findings From the United States and Scottish Populations

Objectives

Previous research has shown that people with obesity are at a higher risk of tooth loss; however, it is unclear whether abdominal obesity (e.g., high waist circumference) is associated with tooth loss among individuals without obesity. This study aims to investigate the association between abdominal obesity and tooth loss among people who are not obese.

Material and Methods

Two cross-sectional surveys were used: the United States' National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 1999–2012 (n = 19,436) and the Scottish Health Survey (SHeS) 2008–2014 (n = 4243). Tooth loss was measured by the number of remaining teeth: 20 and over, 1–19, and edentulous. Abdominal obesity was defined by categorizing waist circumference into three levels: normal, high, and very high. Ordinal logistic regression was used to model the association between tooth loss and abdominal obesity.

Results

For people living without obesity, abdominal obesity is associated with a higher prevalence of tooth loss, and the effect is different between women and men. For women, abdominal obesity increased the chance of tooth loss by 64% (odds ratio [OR]: 1.64, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.16–2.34) in the NHANES and 196% (OR: 2.96, 95% CI: 1.47–5.97) in the SHeS. For men, abdominal obesity increased the chance of tooth loss by 41% (OR: 1.41, 95% CI: 1.06–1.87) in the NHANES and 65% (OR: 1.65, 95% CI: 1.02–2.73) in the SHeS.

Conclusions

This study indicated that the prevalence of tooth loss is substantially higher in people with abdominal obesity, and this association is distinctively different between men and women. These findings suggest that those who are not obese but have abdominal obesity may be an important target population for oral health prevention strategies.