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Wisdom teeth are the third set of molars in the back of the mouth. Some people don’t have wisdom teeth at all, but for those who do, they usually break through the gums during a person’s teenage years or early 20s. It is not always medically necessary to have wisdom teeth removed, but dentists often recommend doing so to avoid possible future health problems such as tooth decay and gum disease. The risk of these problems increases with impacted wisdom teeth, which are more difficult to clean given their location in the back of the mouth.
Revised content
Claim:
Wisdom teeth are meridian lines connected to the heart. their removal causes heart problems
Cultivate Raise, Matt Roske08-05-2024
Verdict detail
Seductive: Evidence shows that wisdom tooth removal can reduce the risk of tooth and gum infections. This may, albeit indirectly, reduce the spread of infection to other parts of the body, such as the heart.
Unsupported: There is no scientific evidence to support the claim that meridian lines are real. On this basis, the claim that interfering with the meridian lines through the removal of wisdom teeth leads to heart problems is not supported.
Complete claim
“Wizards are also connected to the heart, so a lot of times when people get their wisdom teeth removed, they actually start developing heart problems […] All your teeth are meridian lines, so if you mess with those meridian lines, you mess with all the pathways of the body.”
Review
A Instagram reel shared on August 5, 2024, claimed that removing wisdom teeth can cause people to “develop heart problems”. He also claimed that all teeth are meridian lines, “so if you mess with these meridian lines, you mess with all the pathways of the body.” The scroll was republished in other social media accountsincluding one Post on Facebook which had received almost a million plays and more than 6,500 likes at the time of writing.
The person speaking in the reel, Matt Roeske, is a co-founder Cultivate Raisea company that sells herbs and supplements that claim to help with “energy, focus and vitality.” Science Feedback has previously investigated unsubstantiated claims by Roeske that there are no viruses and that peanut oil causes peanut allergies.
Although wisdom tooth extraction is not always medically necessary, we could find no scientific evidence to support the claim that wisdom tooth removal leads to heart problems. Conversely, there are oral health risks associated with compliance one’s wisdom teeth, as we will explain below.
What are wisdom teeth and why do dentists recommend removing them?
Guardians (also called “third molars”) are the final set of permanent teeth that erupt in the back of the mouth, usually during a person’s teenage years or early 20s. The term “wise” is believed to be associated with their arrival in adulthood, the idea is that one is older and wiser when those teeth erupt.
However, the presence and eruption of wisdom teeth varies from person to person. In fact, some people never get wisdom teeth at all. Others may have impacted wisdom teethwhich occur when teeth become completely or partially trapped in the gums or jawbone. Figure 1 below illustrates the different ways impacted wisdom teeth can develop.
Figure 1 – Types of molars (indicated by right tooth) versus second molars (indicated by left tooth). Impacted wisdom teeth can grow and protrude at various angles, including the second molar (convergent) or away from the front of the mouth (divergent). Sometimes the wisdom teeth are not there at all. Source: Campbell et al.
THE American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons (AAOMS) estimates that “[n]one in ten people has at least one impacted wisdom tooth.” Informed Health Onlinethe patient information portal for Germany’s national healthcare system, estimates that “[u]up to 80% of young adults in Europe have at least one uncracked wisdom tooth.”
Risks associated with impacted wisdom teeth include damage to adjacent teeth, gum disease (periodontitis), and tooth decay, as these teeth are more difficult to clean properly.
Wisdom tooth surgery may not always be medically necessary if these teeth grow fully in the right places and can be properly cleaned. However, given the low risk of complications— especially between youth— dentists often recommends wisdom tooth removal as a preventive measure to maintain dental health.
Poor oral health is linked to heart disease, although the reasons for this link remain unclear
THE AAOMS shared that “[o]ral bacteria can travel from your mouth through the bloodstream, where it can lead to possible systemic infections and diseases that affect the heart, kidneys and other organs.”
In one interview at Penn State Healthcardiologist Andrew Waxler said:
“We’ve known for years that people who have infections in their mouths – such as cavities and other problems – are at greater risk of what’s called endocarditis. That’s a fancy way of saying heart valve infection.”
Thus, because wisdom tooth removal may reduce the risk of oral infections, it may also indirectly reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease by reducing the overall risk of infection. This contradicts Roeske’s claim, which stated that removing wisdom teeth causes people to “develop heart problems.”
However, it is important to note that the reasons for this link between poor oral health and cardiovascular disease remain speculative, although scientists do seems to agree in some theories.
The first is that the bacteria that cause tooth and gum infections can travel to and cause damage to other parts of the body, such as the coronary artery, which carries oxygen-rich blood to the heart. According to Waxler, “people can get strep bacteria from the mouth that gets into the bloodstream (sic) and goes down and latches onto the valves and causes an infection.”
The second is that inflammatory responses—such as those that occur in response to tooth or gum infection—can set off a chain reaction of inflammatory responses throughout the body. It has been shown that chronic inflammation they play a role in heart diseases[1,2].
Confounding factors—in this case, habits or behaviors not directly related to oral health, such as smoking or being sedentary—may also support the association seen between poor oral health and heart disease. For example, it is possible that those who smoke or lead a sedentary life tend to pay less attention to oral health. Therefore, these habits may be associated with poor oral health, even though they are not directly causal.
There is no scientific evidence to show that meridian lines are real
In the scroll, Roeske implied that because teeth are “meridian lines” connected to the brain and heart, heart problems can occur as a result of wisdom teeth removal.
The concept of meridians stems from ancient practitioners of traditional chinese medicine. Simply put, the idea is that the meridian lines carry blood and energy throughout the body, so disruptions to this energy flow can have negative health consequences.
However, we were unable to find any research to support the purported benefits of using meridian lines to promote health. We searched PubMed#, a digital article repository maintained by the US National Library of Medicine, for studies related to meridians, dental health, and cardiovascular health. The search returned no results.
Also, Scientific American and Science-Based Medicine reported in 2004 and 2012 respectively that there is no scientific evidence to show that meridians exist.
Roeske’s claim that wisdom tooth removal causes “heart problems” is therefore untenable for most of the general population. That said, invasive dental procedures such as tooth extraction can occasionally cause complications in patients at high risk for endocarditis[3]. However, this has nothing to do with the meridian lines, and these patients can prevention of complications by taking antibiotic treatment to reduce the risk of infection.
#PubMed search terms: ((meridal lines[Title/Abstract]) AND (teeth[Title/Abstract])) AND (cardiovascular diseases[Title/Abstract])
