Men, listen to this one. It pays to brush your teeth and floss.

A small study, just published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine, suggests inflamed gums can cause erection problems.

Turkish researchers compared 80 men aged 30 to 40 with erectile dysfunction or ED to a control group of 82 men without erection problems.

53-percent of the men with ED had inflamed gums from periodontal disease, compared with just 23-percent of the control group. When the numbers were crunched, men with severe periodontal disease were more than 3 times more likely to suffer erection problems than men with healthy gums. Inflammation from gum disease has also been linked to coronary heart disease, but this is believed to be the first study linking periodontal disease to erectile dysfunction.

I'm Dr. Cindy Haines of HealthDay TV with the news doctors are reading; health news that matters to you.