What this is about

The most important conditions of the oral cavity — caries and periodontitis — develop slowly. Over months, often over years. By the time the first symptoms appear, the window in which a small intervention is enough is often already closed.

How widespread these findings actually are worldwide is shown by two international data sources: the Global Burden of Disease Study 2021 (GBD 2021), analysed among others in The Lancet, ¹ and the Global Oral Health Status Report 2022 of the World Health Organization. ² This article summarises the main findings of these sources — and puts them in context for your own preventive planning.

What the global figures measure

GBD 2021 is an ongoing, internationally coordinated study that estimates the worldwide disease burden — prevalence, healthy life years, regional distribution — for more than 370 conditions and injuries. For oral health it records, among other things, untreated caries in permanent teeth, untreated caries in deciduous teeth, severe periodontitis, and tooth loss (edentulism). ¹

“Untreated” here means: not yet attended to — not filled, not crowned, not extracted. “Severe periodontitis” follows the international definition based on pocket depth, attachment loss, or the WHO Community Periodontal Index. ² “Edentulism” describes the complete loss of the natural teeth — the result of a long, often decades-long course.

All four findings are slowly progressing processes that cause little pain in their early stages. That makes them typical preventive-care topics: they are more often found at a routine appointment than at one prompted by pain.

How common the main findings are worldwide

The chart below shows the number of people affected worldwide for the four findings. The values are global estimates for 2021 from GBD 2021; the order of magnitude for severe periodontitis (around one billion) matches the figure given by the WHO in the Global Oral Health Status Report 2022. ^{1 2}

What these numbers say — and what they don’t

Three points from the data:

• Oral health is a mass question. Untreated caries in permanent teeth, according to the GBD 2021 estimates, is one of the most widespread health burdens in the world. ¹ Severe periodontitis affects roughly one billion adults. ² These are not rare findings, but everyday ones.
• The courses are long. Edentulism — the complete loss of teeth — is not the beginning but often the end of a decades-long history of caries, periodontitis, and interventions on the tooth. Where this endpoint can be avoided, it happens not in a single session, but in many small, early steps.
• Averages do not replace an individual finding. These figures describe worldwide populations, not individual patients. Whether you are likelier to have an uneventful course or a higher-risk one can be assessed in a few minutes at the appointment with mirror, probe, and a sounding of the gingival pockets — a global estimate cannot do that.

What a preventive-care appointment delivers

“No pain, no problem” is an intuitive assumption that works for many physical complaints — but often not for the mouth. Caries and periodontitis cause little to no pain in their early stages. What could be cleared up in five minutes at the appointment can grow over five years into a root-canal treatment or a periodontal therapy.

Preventive care does not replace these conditions; it makes their early forms visible sooner and reduces the likelihood that small spots turn into larger ones.

What a preventive-care appointment includes, beyond the cleaning:

• Findings with probe and mirror: small spots not visible to the naked eye
• Sounding of the gingival pockets at selected sites — the most important early indicator for periodontitis
• Comparison with the last appointment — what has changed, what stays stable
• A conversation about risk factors in your everyday life (diet, brushing technique, medications that change salivary flow)

A realistic preventive-care frequency for healthy adults is one to two appointments per year. Those with a higher individual risk — see our piece on professional dental cleaning — come in more often.

When an appointment outside the regular rhythm is worth the trip:

• Gum bleeding that lasts longer than two weeks
• Sensitivity to cold or warm that newly appears or persists
• Visible discolourations or small cracks
• Changed bite comfort, a wobbly feeling at one tooth

These observations need not be an emergency. They are, however, a good reason to look in earlier than planned.

If you’d like to schedule an appointment

If you’re considering scheduling a preventive-care appointment — whether for your regular rhythm or because you’re unsure whether something has appeared since the last visit — we’d welcome a call. You’ll find an overview of our preventive services under Preventive care; you can request an appointment through the contact form or by phone.

For your routine at home, the companion pieces Your child’s first visit to the dentist and Professional dental cleaning are useful; we explain the term caries briefly in the glossary.

About this article. This piece draws on publicly available international data: the Global Burden of Disease Study 2021, analysed in The Lancet (2025), and the Global Oral Health Status Report 2022 of the World Health Organization. The values shown in the chart are global estimates for 2021 and say nothing about the individual finding of any one person — they do not replace a conversation with a dentist in practice.