Medical Hypotheses
Volume 52, Issue 3 , Pages 209-212, March 1999

Mouth bacteria as the cause of Paget's disease of bone

Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine, St Bartholomew's & Royal London School of Medicine & Dentistry, Charterhouse Square, London, EC1M 6BQ, U.K.

Received 30 June 1997; accepted 8 September 1997.

Abstract 

The many viruses associated with Pagetic osteoclasts could be opportunistic rather than causative. Some mouth bacteria can lyse bone. One (Actinobacillus actinomycetemcomitans) can grow and even multiply inside human cell lines in culture, producing osteolytic materials – one 62 kDa protein having a potency in the picomolar range. A small focus of this, or of one of the other periodontitis-causing bacteria, in a bone might gradually spread its influence to activate osteoclasts – the first stage in Paget's disease. The focus in each bone might be small and easily overlooked, as other intracellular bacteria have been in the past.

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PII: S0306-9877(97)90644-7

doi:10.1054/mehy.1997.0644

Medical Hypotheses
Volume 52, Issue 3 , Pages 209-212, March 1999

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