Oral health problems in elite athletes ’must be addressed’

Poor oral health affecting athletes' general health and performance shows 'no signs of improvement' and must be remedied, say a group of UCL-led health experts and sporting bodies. In a consensus statement published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine, the authors call for action to tackle poor oral health among athletes. They say that simple measures such as encouraging better brushing and flossing could provide the same marginal performance gains as expensive physical therapies. The statement came out of the April 2014 Oral Health and Performance in Sport collaboration led by Professor Ian Needleman of the UCL Eastman Dental Institute and Professor Fares Haddad of the Institute of Sport Exercise and Health (ISEH). This resulted in a conference held at UCL where experts in oral health and sports medicine met with sporting associations and elite athletes to produce a consensus on how to improve oral health in sport. A UCL survey at the London 2012 Olympic Games found that 18% of athletes said that their oral health had a negative impact on their performance and 46.5% had not been to the dentist in the past year. The latest consensus statement aims to address such issues by embedding oral health into the wider culture of sports healthcare and health promotion.