RANCHO SANTA FE — The stormy weather didn’t dampen the attendance numbers for a special presentation at the Rancho Santa Fe Senior Center. On Jan. 20, Dr. Weston Spencer, DDS who has practices in both Rancho Santa Fe and La Jolla, shared valuable information between the relationship of dental and overall health.
According to Spencer, maintaining dental health was essential on many levels.
“Your mouth health plays such a big role in everything else,” he said
Spencer also touched upon recent news questioning the need for flossing. As far as Spencer was concerned, while flossing may not minimize cavity occurrence, it does help tremendously with reducing gum inflammation. And this inflammation can impact one’s health and wellness.
“The gum health relationship to the rest of the body is incredibly important particularly as we age in life because that’s when oftentimes we’re more susceptible to chronic diseases like diabetes, heart disease, Alzheimer’s, and the other big ones out there,” Spencer said. “If you’ve got your body constantly fighting an inflammatory process in your mouth, it’s going to have a lot more difficulty fighting things elsewhere.”
Spencer pointed out how he knows a handful of doctors who are heart surgeons. Depending on the type of heart surgery, some doctors require that their patients have a thorough dental cleaning beforehand to make sure they are free of periodontal disease so they are cleared for surgery.
“There are a lot of doctors that are actually doing this more often now,” Spencer said. “So flossing is still to me one of the best solutions to reduce inflammation,” he said.
Other topics Spencer discussed were dental X-rays and dental implants.
Following the presentation, Spencer thanked all for attending and remained on hand to answer questions.
