it is sort of the other way around: if you DO NOT brush your teeth, your risk of heart disease increases here is why: Poor dental hygiene and not brush your teeth regularly can cause unhealthy teeth, bleeding gums which might boosts the risk of heart attacks and strokes according to researchers at a September 2008 meeting of the Society for General Microbiology in Dublin. ....People with poor dental hygiene and those who don't brush their teeth regularly end up with bleeding gums, which provide an entry to the bloodstream for up to 700 different types of bacteria found in the human mouth. Failing to scrub clean your teeth will cause those germs to flourish. Many are essential to good health, and some are benign. Few trigger a biological cascade leading to chronic bacterial infections that have been associated with atherosclerosis, the main risk factor of heart attacks. "The mouth is probably the dirtiest place in the human body. If you have an open blood vessel from bleeding gums, bacteria will gain entry to your bloodstream. When bacteria get into the bloodstream they encounter tiny fragments called platelets that clot blood when you get a cut. By sticking to the platelets bacteria cause them to clot inside the blood vessel, partially blocking it. This prevents the blood flow back to the heart and we run the risk of suffering a heart attack." said Dr Steve Kerrigan of the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin, Ireland.