April 29, 2025 - News
Katarina Bertl, Associate professor, Department of Periodontology, Faculty of Medicine, Sigmund Freud University Vienna and Andreas Stavropoulos, Professor, Department of Periodontology, Malmö University received Eklund Foundation grant of €162 000 in 2024. Thank you for sharing your thoughts on the grant and your project “The Oral Health project within the IBD Prognosis study”
What does the grant mean to your research?
The grant means a lot to our research! We started this project about 2 years ago by collecting clinical data and sampling saliva and stool samples of about 150 newly diagnosed patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), an umbrella term for Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. This grant allows us to analyse the microbiome and microbial proteome profiles of all these samples.
What are you studying?
The present study, i.e., the “Oral Health Project within the IBD Prognosis study”, is one of the first in Europe to recruit newly diagnosed adult IBD patients systematically. We are studying the potential impact of oral health-related aspects, such as caries, periodontal diseases, and oral microbiome, on IBD’s course and treatment response from diagnosis until 5 years thereafter.
What is the aim of the study?
We aim to assess the oral health status, including the oral microbiome of IBD patients, and relate it to IBD activity, severity, treatment needs, and treatment response.
You also received the Eklund Foundation in 2017 for a study about Periodontitis prevalence in Colitis & Crohn’s disease patients– can you tell us a little bit about the results of that study?
The 2017 questionnaire-based project paved the way for the current clinical study. From approximately 4500 participants, we found that IBD patients have significantly worse oral health, more periodontal problems, reduced oral health-related quality of life, and fewer teeth. Additionally, they visit the dentist more frequently, require more dental treatments, and spend more on dental care than non-IBD controls. IBD patients with fewer teeth and/or self-reported severe periodontitis scored significantly higher on the IBD disability index. They reported a significantly increased disease activity compared to those with better oral health.