Live dietary microbes and reduced prevalence of periodontitis: A <scp>cross‐sectional</scp> study

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:sec><jats:title>Objective</jats:title><jats:p>Investigate the link between live dietary microbe consumption and the prevalence of periodontitis.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Methods and Materials</jats:title><jats:p>National health and nutrition examination survey (2009–2014) data was used to assess the association among adults. Live dietary microbe intake was categorized as low or medium to high. Regression models were employed to assess this association, adjusting for demographic variables and other covariates. Examined dose–response relationship and conducted subgroup analyses by ethnicity, age and gender. Multiplicative interactions were evaluated using likelihood ratio tests.</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Results</jats:title><jats:p>The analysis included 8574 participants. After adjusting for various factors including age, gender, ethnicity, dietary habits, dietary inflammatory index, alcohol consumption, smoking status, hypertension, diabetes mellitus and oral health behaviors, individuals with daily intake of medium to high levels of live dietary microbes showed a significantly reduced risk of periodontitis compared to those who did not consume such microbes with a dose–response trend (<jats:italic>p</jats:italic> for trend <0.0001, <jats:italic>p</jats:italic> < 0.01). Significant differences in the impact of live microbe intake on periodontitis were also observed across different age groups in all Models (<jats:italic>p</jats:italic> for interaction ≤0.05).</jats:p></jats:sec><jats:sec><jats:title>Conclusion</jats:title><jats:p>Medium to high live dietary microbe consumption independently correlates with lower periodontitis risk, irrespective of traditional risk factors and demographics.</jats:p></jats:sec>