• Marie Claire O'Dwyer, Allison Furgal, Wendy Furst, Manasi Ramakrishnan, Nicoll Capizzano, Ananda Sen, and Michael Klinkman.
• From the Department of Family Medicine, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI (MCO, AF, WF, MR, NC, AS, MK); Department of Biostatistics, School of Public Health, University of Michigan (AF, AS). marieclo@med.umich.edu.
• J Am Board Fam Med. 2023 Apr 3; 36 (2): 313324313-324.

IntroductionOften misperceived as solely a dental disease, periodontitis is a chronic condition characterized by inflammation of the support structures of the tooth and associated with chronic systemic inflammation and endothelial dysfunction. Despite affecting almost 40% of US adults 30 years of age or older, periodontitis is rarely considered when quantifying the multimorbidity (the presence of 2 or more chronic conditions in an individual) burden for our patients. Multimorbidity represents a major challenge for primary care and is associated with increasing health care expenditure and increased hospitalizations. We hypothesized that periodontitis was associated with multimorbidity.MethodsTo interrogate our hypothesis, we performed a secondary data analysis of a population-based cross-sectional survey, the NHANES 2011 to 2014 dataset. The study population included US adults aged 30 years or older who underwent a periodontal examination. Prevalence of periodontitis in individuals with and without multimorbidity was calculated using likelihood estimates and adjusting for confounding variables with logistic regression models.ResultsIndividuals with multimorbidity were more likely than the general population and individuals without multimorbidity to have periodontitis. However, in adjusted analyses, there was no independent association between periodontitis and multimorbidity. Given the absence of an association, we included periodontitis as a qualifying condition for the diagnosis of multimorbidity. As a result, the prevalence of multimorbidity in US adults 30 years and older increased from 54.1% to 65.8%.DiscussionPeriodontitis is a highly prevalent, preventable chronic inflammatory condition. It shares many common risk factors with multimorbidity but was not independently associated with multimorbidity in our study. Further research is required to understand these observations and whether treating periodontitis in patients with multimorbidity may improve health care outcomes.© Copyright by the American Board of Family Medicine.

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