At my annual bodily, my physician asks about my weight loss plan, sleep, and stress ranges.
When most individuals go to the dentist, they get requested—largely—in the event that they’re flossing.
For forty years, I’ve watched dentists (myself included) focus virtually totally on mechanical cleansing—brushing, flossing, fluoride—whereas fully ignoring the surroundings these tooth are sitting in all day!
We handled the mouth like a sink that wanted scrubbing. However your mouth isn’t a sink. It’s an ecosystem. And similar to any ecosystem, it thrives or struggles primarily based on the circumstances you create for it.
One of the crucial missed components is hydration and electrolyte stability.
Thirty years in the past, I wouldn’t have believed I’d be writing about electrolytes and oral well being…don’t all of us affiliate electrolytes with physique builders and marathon runners?
However right here’s what I’ve realized: the well being of your saliva determines the well being of your oral microbiome. And the well being of your oral microbiome determines virtually every thing else.
Most individuals suppose saliva is simply water. And sure, it’s 99% water—however that different 1% is doing a little significantly heavy lifting.
That 1% consists of:
- Electrolytes (sodium, potassium, calcium, magnesium, bicarbonate, phosphate)
- Antimicrobial proteins
- Enzymes
- Antibodies
- pH buffers
What stunned me most: the viscosity of your saliva—how thick or skinny it’s—straight impacts which micro organism can thrive in your mouth.
Consider viscosity like this: honey is thick and strikes slowly (excessive viscosity). Water is skinny and flows quick (low viscosity). Your saliva must be proper within the center—not too thick, stringy or ropey, and never too watery.
While you’re correctly hydrated and your electrolytes are balanced, your saliva has the right consistency. It’s not too thick, not too skinny. This permits the mucin proteins in your saliva to develop and create a protecting coating over your tooth and gums—a biofilm, however the good sort.
While you’re dehydrated, all the system shifts…
Your saliva will get thicker and stickier. Circulation fee drops. The antimicrobial proteins can’t do their job as properly. And all of a sudden, the micro organism that shouldn’t be there begin taking on.
Research on sufferers with dry mouth (xerostomia) present clear shifts of their oral microbiome—extra pathogenic species, fewer health-associated species. The identical sample reveals up in people who find themselves chronically dehydrated, even when they don’t really feel “dry mouth.”
The Dysbiosis Cascade
When your saliva movement decreases and its composition adjustments, you enter what researchers name “dysbiosis”—an imbalance in your microbial ecosystem.
Right here’s what occurs:
- Helpful micro organism (like Streptococcus salivarius) decline
- Pathogenic micro organism (like Porphyromonas, Fusobacterium, Prevotella intermedia) enhance
- Biofilm structure shifts from protecting to inflammatory
- Your danger for cavities, gum illness, and even systemic irritation goes up
This may occur even when you’re brushing and flossing completely.
I’ve seen it a whole lot of occasions. Sufferers who had been meticulous about oral hygiene however nonetheless struggled with cavities, bleeding gums, or persistent dangerous breath. After we dug deeper, the problem wasn’t their brushing method. It was their inside surroundings.
You possibly can brush and floss daily—however these are all issues that help the oral microbiome solely when your saliva has the correct viscosity. With out that basis, your mouth is in bother.
To not point out…most toothpastes dehydrate and dry your mouth—like most soaps dry your pores and skin.
Your salivary glands want electrolytes to supply wholesome saliva.
Particularly:
- Bicarbonate acts as a pH buffer, neutralizing acids that trigger cavities
- Calcium and phosphate help remineralization of tooth enamel
- Sodium and potassium regulate fluid stability and saliva movement
- Magnesium helps enzyme operate and mineral absorption
While you’re low on electrolytes—whether or not from dehydration, poor weight loss plan, extreme caffeine, or persistent stress—your saliva composition shifts. Bicarbonate drops. pH turns into extra acidic. Mineral content material decreases.
And similar to that, you’ve created an surroundings the place cavity-causing micro organism thrive.
In the event you’re low in electrolytes, you are inclined to lose moisture and usually tend to get dehydrated.
In the event you don’t have sufficient electrolytes exterior your cells, water will get pulled into the cells and away out of your tissues and blood, dehydrating you; when you have too many, water will get pulled out of the cells, making you hypertonic—so the stability of electrolytes is what retains your physique’s water in the correct place.
We get too few electrolytes in the present day as a result of fashionable diets are low in mineral-rich complete meals, our water is stripped of pure minerals, and stress, sweating, caffeine, alcohol, and drugs all enhance electrolyte loss.
It’s possible you’ll be dehydrated and low on electrolytes when you discover fatigue, headache, dry mouth, mind fog, darker urine, muscle cramps, or feeling thirsty even after ingesting water.
This is the reason I started paying nearer consideration to electrolytes in my each day routine. I’m loving these ones.
Whereas electrolytes create the bodily basis for a wholesome oral microbiome, inexperienced tea polyphenols create the organic basis.
The primary polyphenol in inexperienced tea—EGCG (epigallocatechin gallate)—has been proven to:
- Disrupt pathogenic biofilm formation (particularly the “dangerous” micro organism like S. mutans)
- Cut back bacterial adhesion to tooth
- Shift the oral microbiome towards health-associated species
- Decrease irritation in gum tissue
However right here’s what makes inexperienced tea so elegant: it doesn’t kill micro organism indiscriminately like antiseptic mouthwash does. It selectively disrupts the biofilms of pathogenic micro organism whereas permitting useful micro organism to thrive.
Even higher is that green tea acts as a prebiotic—it feeds the great micro organism you need whereas ravenous out the dangerous ones.
That is precisely what you need. You want micro organism in your mouth. You simply want the correct stability of micro organism.
This realization ultimately knowledgeable the creation of a prebiotic toothpaste firm I co-founded. Most toothpastes concentrate on killing micro organism. Fygg focuses on feeding the correct micro organism whereas rebuilding enamel with nano-hydroxyapatite.
I’ve been ingesting this inexperienced tea for the previous twenty years or so, and I’ve observed a measurable distinction in my oral well being. Much less plaque buildup. Cleaner-feeling tooth. And my hygienist has commented that my gums look higher than they’ve in years.
In the event you’re coping with:
- Recurring cavities regardless of good oral hygiene
- Bleeding gums
- Persistent dangerous breath
- Dry mouth
- Tooth sensitivity
…your dentist must be asking about your hydration standing, your electrolyte consumption, and what you’re ingesting all through the day.
To not point out—when you’re ingesting inexperienced tea, then you definitely’re displacing different seemingly-healthy drinks that wreak havoc on the oral microbiome—Ollipop, kombucha, and many others.
Inexperienced tea’s pH is barely acidic, however nowhere close to soda or juice territory.
In the event you’d wish to continue learning, try my interview with Natural Olivia, “Holy Spit.”
Hope you could have a terrific week,
Mark
P.S. Sadly, many of the dental discipline isn’t considering this fashion but. However that’s altering. Purposeful dentistry is lastly catching as much as what the analysis has been displaying for years: your oral well being is inseparable out of your systemic well being.
If you wish to discover a dentist who will get this, try my Purposeful Dentist Listing.
These are practitioners who take a look at the mouth as a part of the entire physique, not only a assortment of tooth to wash.
>> In the event you’re a dentist or hygienist who’d like to hitch us, hit reply—I might love to listen to from you!