Implications of sleep disorders for periodontitis.

PURPOSE: Periodontitis is a chronic inflammatory disease caused by multi-factors. Sleep is a natural physiologic process, and the sleep duration, quality, and patterns might be associated with periodontitis. Meanwhile, periodontitis might in turn induce systemic inflammation and thus impact sleep in different ways as well. METHODS: To investigate the bidirectional relationship between sleep disorder and periodontitis, a literature search was conducted to reveal the interaction and possible mechanism between these two diseases. RESULTS: The results show that sleep disorders can affect the progression of periodontitis via some pathomechanisms, and periodontitis also has a reverse impact on sleep. CONCLUSION: Although the epidemiologic and clinical trials found the possible associations between sleep disorder and periodontitis, their relationship is still not that explicit. Further studies are warranted to shed light on them, to improve preventive health care.