Women who are trying to become pregnant should look after their oral health a new report has shown. There are fertility experts that have announced this very same thing at the 2011 European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology meeting in Stockholm earlier this week. According to the first round of research that has been conducted it has predominantly shown up that gum disease can go on to make a woman’s chances of getting pregnant by an average of two months or more.

The data that has been collected goes on to suggest that periodontal disease is a great risk factor, which can increase a woman’s time to conception, particularly for non-Caucasians according to Roger Hart who is the Professor of Reproductive Medicine at the University of Western Australia and Medical Director of Fertility Specialists of Western Australia. The gum disease goes on to have a negative influence on fertility that can be as bad as obesity.

Roger Hart and his colleagues studied as many as 3,400 pregnant women from Western Australia. They found that women with gum disease took two months longer on average to conceive than women without gum disease which was quite a revelation. From the data collected it was realized that Non-Caucasian women appeared to be the group that was most affected. They were likely to take more than 12 months to become pregnant if they had gum disease.

This point out to the fact that all women who plan to have a family should be encouraged to see their general practitioner and find out their oral health before trying to conceive according to Roger Hart. Also, they should be encouraged to visit their dentist and have any gum disease treated before trying to conceive as that will be of immense help.

The other things that the study confirmed were the other negative factors such as the age of the woman and if she was over 35 years of age, being overweight or obese, and being a smoker. All of these were the other factors besides oral health.