The Link Between Periodontitis, Smoking and Oral Cancer

Periodontitis is a widely prevalent disease worldwide that has serious public health consequences. Its prognosis includes tooth loss and edentulism, a condition that negatively affects chewing causing functional disability; and esthetics causing social impairment. Consequently, periodontitis may end up causing marked impairment of the quality of life of the affected patients, impairment of general health and increasing the dental care costs significantly. Changes in the oral mucosa arise by primary products resulting from tissue breakdown due to gingivitis. It then triggers the host cells to produce proteinases that mediate loss of marginal periodontal ligaments, apical migration of the junctional epithelium and apical spread of bacterial biofilm. Therefore, this research aims to identify the risk of smoking to both periodontitis and oral cancer, and the risk of periodontitis to oral cancer.