Correlation of Blood Sugar Levels and Chronic Periodontitis in Out-Patients Visiting a Dental Hospital

Introduction: Periodontitis is the inflammation of the periodontium including periodontal ligament and alveolar bone. It is a multifactorial disease which is caused by the activity of microbial invasion followed by destruction of periodontal tissues. The major risk factor involved is smoking which increases the severity of the disease and other conditions like diabetes, immunocompromised state, medication and also genetic factors. Diabetes mellitus is a disorder which is characterized to have altered glucose or impaired lipid and carbohydrate mechanisms. Diabetes has been confirmed as a major risk factor for causing periodontitis.

Aim: To assess the correlation of blood sugar levels and chronic periodontitis in out-patients visiting a dental hospital.

Materials and Methods: The study was conducted among the outpatients of Saveetha dental college. The data was collected and analysed from a total number of 5,35,951 patients between June 2019 - February 2021 and the sample size was 65. The data was collected from DIAS (Dental Information Archiving Software) and statistically analysed using SPSS software.

Results: 52.3% of female population has chronic periodontitis where it was 47.7% in male population. From the age group of 21-30 years 20% of the chronic periodontitis individuals were diabetic, which was highest when compared to other age groups. The male population with 30.77% had diabetes and female population with 33.85% had diabetes.

Conclusion: Within the limitation of the study, there exists a positive correlation between increased blood sugar levels and chronic periodontitis. And the presence of increased blood sugar levels were seen in the age groups 61-70 years and more commonly seen in the female population. So people with poorly glycemic controls must be considered as a risk factor for periodontitis and people with diabetes must be informed of the risk factors.