Nutrition for Oral Health
Eat food. Mostly plants. Not too much.
—Michael Pollan, Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual
There is no doubt that supporting our body with quality nutrition and smart eating habits is a cornerstone of health. As a dentist, I am excited about the pentose non-sugar sweetener called xylitol, because it offers a powerful tool for improving tooth and mouth health, but it is also a great, but poorly understood, contributor to our digestive and general health. Xylitol stabilizes blood glucose levels, is helpful to diabetics, provides fiber and butyrate for digestive health, and can also positively influence nasal, sinus, pharyngeal, and potentially bone health. Most people are aware that many foods contain nutrients that offer us health benefits. Many of these foods are acidic, and I am often asked how to eat healthy foods like citrus fruits or drink liquids like cider vinegar, which are good for the body, but which are sufficiently acidic to cause erosion and damage to our teeth. In this chapter we will discuss how nutrition affects oral health and how to consume potentially tooth-damaging, yet healthy foods, without causing dental erosion or other damage.
As a teenager in England, I was very aware of nutrition, and I joined the whole-food movement of the 1960s, which taught the importance of diet for good health. I learned about the benefits of consuming certain foods, and I became convinced that a diet centered on natural foods, including whole grains, live-culture yogurt, nuts, fruits, and vegetables, could promote health. I read books about food science and followed health gurus who taught Eastern medicine and the benefits of adding herbs and spices to meals.
I have always valued a healthy diet, but I think it may be shortsighted to imagine there’s a one-size-fits-all specific food selection for everyone. I believe some foods may suit certain people and that our needs may change as we age or adopt different lifestyles over the years. Portion control, variety, and moderation make sense, but so does the inclusion of fermented, seasonal, and local foods and the addition of herbs and spices. Updated science indicates that our digestive ecosystem is quickly changed, directed, and dependent on the kinds of food we consume, so that the more limited and unnatural our menu, the more limited and less healthy will be the diversity of bacteria in our digestive tract.
I believe that for health we must find a way to satisfy our body’s needs for all the proteins, vitamins, minerals, flavonoids, and phytonutrients that are necessary to sustain and repair our body. The worst diets for health were probably in the 1980s when people wrongly believed that artificial sugars and processed low-fat foods were good choices. Obviously, it seems wise to control sugar and carbohydrate consumption, but it may be more important to focus on enjoying nutritious food combinations in a relaxed meal format than to fear every ingredient or try to pinpoint one food and blame it for our health problems. We are discovering that foods have many oral and general health benefits, and when they are consumed in certain combinations, their benefits may be enhanced, or one food may offer protection from an ingredient in the other that could otherwise be a problem or cause digestive upset. Remember, eating should be about foods, not ingredients!
I work hard with my clients to improve their mouth health; this usually means we also need to address their digestive health. I believe poor oral health can contribute to poor digestive health and vice versa. As I work with clients, we try to add a wide variety of plant-based foods to their menu choices and often notice substantial improvement in their mouth health as this occurs.
Many people today eliminate entire food groups from their diet, worried that dairy products, for example, are problems for their digestion. I would argue that for health we may benefit from all the food groups, and I believe dairy products should not be grouped as one entity, since 20 ounces of poor quality skim milk in a latte should not be compared with 4 ounces of whole milk from grass-fed, hormone- and antibiotic-free, pasture-raised cows. For these reasons, I usually reintroduce small amounts of high-grade butter (for example, melted with cooked vegetables), even for people who believe they need to eliminate dairy. Once we have introduced butter successfully, we then try 2- to 3-ounce portions of organic, unsweetened yogurt, mixed and sweetened with a teaspoon of maple syrup or xylitol or 1 ounce of fresh pineapple or papaya to aid digestion and counter acid reflux problems.
THE INTERPLAY BETWEEN DIET, DIGESTIVE HEALTH, AND NUTRITION
Dr. Weston Price was a dentist who lived in the early 1900s, and he is known for his observations on how nutrition appeared to affect dental and physical health. Dr. Price is still revered for his work documenting the diet and habits of various cultures and their effect on mouth development and oral health. He, along with many others, concluded that diets with substantial amounts of refined sugar and flour cause deficiencies that result in dental and medical health problems, which can be compounded generation after generation if nutritional deficits continue.
Foods not only affect our general health, they directly influence our mouth’s ecosystem in a positive or negative way as they are chewed and eaten. The more sugary and refined our diet, the more we feed the harmful bacteria and yeasts that use these sugars and carbohydrates to grow and form sticky plaque on our teeth. In a similar way, our diet affects the variety of bacteria in our digestive tract, for better or worse. We now know that the more limited and unhealthy our diet, the more limited and unhealthy will be our variety of digestive bacteria. High-carbohydrate diets can promote harmful bacteria, but a limited or deficient diet can also cause problems. This is because, without digestive bacterial diversity, we may consume healthy foods but be unable to adequately absorb nutrients from them. The body depends on good nutrition to heal itself, and our immune system can be compromised by an inadequate selection of supportive foods or by poor absorption of nutrients from healthy foods that are consumed, but not adequately digested. This can occur when we have poor digestive health or when there is a speeding up of the passage of food during digestion, something that can occur in times of stress or hormonal imbalance.
Healthy digestive bacteria, adequate stress control, eating slowly, and a good diet are essential for the absorption of nutrients into our blood and bodily fluids. These absorbed nutrients travel around the body and become incorporated into saliva, affecting its quality and healing powers of our teeth and gums. This is why, for optimal mouth health, we should try to nurture a wide diversity of digestive bacteria and eat a varied diet that includes a healthy selection of plant-based foods.
DIGESTIVE HEALTH AND ORAL HEALING
Any acidic or sugar-containing foods or drinks—even healthy ones like fruit—can damage teeth. You don’t have to remove these healthy foods from your diet, because there is a simple way to overcome the negative effects of localized acidity in your mouth and enjoy the positive general health benefits these foods offer. Up to a point, we should embrace the mineral loss that happens when we are eating and drinking. Healthy saliva will quickly provide minerals to replace any that were lost, and the newly deposited minerals will actually help to keep our teeth shiny and strong. This is why good eating and drinking habits allow periodic mineral loss but the lost minerals are immediately replaced from saliva. This is why we must complete every meal with a drink or food that alkalizes the mouth and then give time for our saliva to interact with our teeth. With this approach, we can stop worrying and consume potentially tooth-damaging foods without concern.
Xylitol is my ultimate choice immediately after acidic exposures, because it stimulates a flow of mineral-rich saliva into your mouth to encourage this mineral repair.
Acid-Alkaline Balance
We’ve talked about erosive tooth damage caused by mouth acidity and the benefits of mineral-rich alkaline saliva for mineralizing teeth to keep them strong. Some people consider that a similar acid-versus-alkaline balance for general health and suggest specific foods believed to alkalize the body for this purpose. It is confusing that many of the foods and drinks that are recommended for body alkalizing are extremely acidic, with a low pH and the potential to cause substantial damage and erosion to your teeth. Lemon juice and apple cider vinegar, for example, can cause dramatic problems for your teeth, yet they can be great for health and boosting your immune system. So, the dilemma is how to benefit from these things while avoiding any damage in your mouth.
The ideal solution is to consume foods and drinks as components of mealtimes and to not worry about their pH or acidity, providing the final food in your mouth is something that is alkaline, such as a piece of cheese, celery, or xylitol. Andrew Rugg-Gunn, professor at the Human Nutrition Research Centre at Newcastle University, United Kingdom, has authored many studies showing the effects of food on teeth over the past twenty years. This pattern of eating allows you freedom to eat any food safely, but you always end the meal with a tooth-protective food.
FOOD PAIRING
Most people are aware that many of the foods we consume contain an abundance of vitamins, minerals, and other important health nutrients. A new science of food pairing shows that when we eat foods in specific combinations, we can increase their nutritional value to a level that is higher than the sum of eating them individually, which allows us to reap additional health benefits. Most combinations taste really good and encourage meal-style eating. For example, studies at Purdue University showed that by adding eggs to salad, we can increase our absorption of nutrients from the egg and the salad greens, compared with eating these foods individually. The study showed that adding three eggs to a salad increased the absorption of carotenoids from the vegetables by three- to nine-fold, compared with an eggless salad.
Other food combinations work by offering a way for minerals to be more easily absorbed, or they may nurture specific kinds of digestive bacteria. For example, bananas are a good source of inulin fiber, and inulin supports a kind of digestive bacteria that is responsible for increasing calcium absorption from the gut. When bananas are eaten alongside whole milk, custard, or yogurt, this combination increases the body’s uptake of calcium from the dairy. Spinach is another food that can be paired to increase its nutritional value. Spinach is nutritious, but it contains oxalate, which is an acid with sufficient strength to pull calcium out of teeth and cause tooth erosion. Oxalate also interferes with your body’s ability to absorb calcium from the spinach, since oxalates bind calcium. Adding some vitamin C, like citrus juice, can help block oxalates from binding with calcium, and light steaming can also reduce the oxalates in spinach and limit this effect while preserving the water-soluble minerals that would be lost in boiling water. To increase the absorption of fat-soluble minerals from spinach or other green vegetables, consider adding a small serving of butter to these foods.
Incidentally, the oxalates in spinach do not interfere with calcium absorption from other foods that may be eaten with spinach, but it does take fifteen or more cups of spinach to match the amount of calcium in a cup of milk, which means that relying on spinach for daily calcium may not be a good idea.
Vitamin C also helps increase the absorption of iron from meat, so it is good to serve vegetables high in vitamin C, like chili or bell peppers, kale, broccoli, and cauliflower as accompaniments to meat dishes. Similarly, the vitamins in strawberries and blueberries are better absorbed if they are eaten in combination with dairy (think about strawberries and cream) or alongside foods that are rich in vitamin E (such as almond, peanut, or sunflower seed butter), since vitamins C and E appear to have synergistic absorption benefits. These examples are just a few of the amazing new discoveries about food pairing for health.
Protecting Enamel
I have already mentioned one or two reasons why it is ideal to end meals with xylitol, but it’s useful to know that certain other foods can also offer tooth-protective benefits. Some of these protective foods can be eaten alongside damaging acidic drinks or sugary snacks to help protect your teeth. For example, nibbling cheese will alkalize your mouth and help mineralize teeth between sips of acidic wine. Whole milk, but not skim milk, can protect teeth and help to prevent acidic damage, which makes it a useful drink alongside sugary products, like an occasional cookie or piece of cake. Snacking on fresh or nutritious dried fruits or drinking fruit juice may be delicious, but this can cause horrific tooth damage, because the sugars in these foods and drinks allow the mouth to become and remain acidic for an hour after every sip, snack, or meal. After drinking acidic or sugary juices or snacks, consider having some xylitol in the form of a mint or piece of gum, some cheese or a drink of whole milk.
Tooth damage depends on the length of time that the mouth is acidic. This is why nibbling a small sugary or acidic snack over time will create more damage than consuming a larger quantity in one sitting, or ideally as a component part of a meal. This explains why sipping—especially acidic juices, coffee, tea, sports drinks, or smoothies—can be so harmful. Instead, try to consume these foods and drinks as part of a meal, and at the conclusion, end with xylitol, a tooth-protective food, alkaline water, or milk.
A dry mouth or acidic saliva can make it even more difficult to regain a safe, alkaline state in your mouth after eating, and often post-meal acidity will continue to demineralize teeth for hours. The best endings for meals are tooth-protective foods, which also make the best dentally safe snacks. These foods include salty nuts, cheese, yogurt, alkaline vegetables like celery, avocado, nut butters, and protein foods, like chicken or turkey and, of course, one of the most convenient, xylitol.
FOODS THAT FIGHT PLAQUE
Many foods have been shown to have so-called antiplaque abilities, but this attribute should always be considered in context. Many of these foods and juices are very acidic, which should make you wary of thinking they offer any practical dental benefits. Cider vinegar or cranberry juice, for example, can severely erode tooth enamel. Also, we now have improved knowledge about the importance of preserving healthy biofilm, something that was never considered in older studies, where biofilm removal was often the goal. I have seen incredible damage in the mouths of people who used inappropriate products as ingredients in their homemade toothpastes and rinses. One lady eroded all her teeth and lost all her fillings by following the bad advice to rinse with apple cider vinegar. Remember that sensible habits and a healthy mixed diet are the fundamental supports for whole-body and oral health, not one magic paste, food, or rinse.
Many oral care products contain ingredients that have been touted to reduce or remove plaque. Even natural care products have used this approach and include oils, baking soda, clays, food extracts, and herbs that are known to eliminate oral biofilm. Remember, we need a foundationally new approach for oral health, and it can be confusing, because most of the old studies suggest that biofilm removal is a benefit. I only recommend products that are able to support the development of healthy biofilm, and I suggest that unless you are convinced a product is tooth-protective you should use it with great caution.
Cranberries, Green Teas, and Cider Vinegar
Cranberries are a food that can damage teeth, and their juice has been studied and shown to reduce plaque. Cranberry juice is extremely acidic, and it is often mixed with other fruit juices as a cocktail. If you were to swish cranberry cocktail or even plain cranberry juice, it could easily ruin your teeth by eroding enamel and causing demineralization. It’s possible you have heard similar studies about grape seed extract, green tea, cider vinegar, and other foods that can reduce dental plaque, but I suggest these are completely inappropriate products for oral care.
Apples
Apples are widely believed to be food for oral health, and they do contain an antioxidant called quercetin, which has antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory properties. Apples also contain polyphenols, which offer specific protection against gum damage by periodontal bacteria. Eating apples can benefit teeth, but always remember that apple juice is damaging. The difference is that juice loses its fiber component, and it is the fiber that protects teeth from the malic acid that apples contain. The difference is that juice loses its fiber component, and it is the fiber that protects teeth from the malic acid that apples contain. This is why I recommend eating apples whole or shredded. Shredding apples is a simple method to make them easy to digest, yet keep them safe for teeth. If you give apple juice to children, this can cause rapid decay, so it should always be consumed during mealtimes, and followed with something tooth-protective like xylitol.
Tea and Coffee
Most teas contain polyphenols or catechins, and green tea has up to six kinds of catechins that have been found to remove dental plaque. Teas can also be acidic, and this is why sipping tea can strip your teeth of its natural protection and allow your teeth to demineralize and stain. Tea may be less harmful to teeth than juice or sodas, provided it contains no sugar or lemon, but avoid sipping tea for too long, and always end your teatime with a tooth-protective food or xylitol.
Coffee is acidic, and it also contains a chemical called trigonelline, which gives it an aroma and taste as well as antibacterial properties. Coffee may cause mouth bacteria to be less adhesive, and sipping it slowly can be a problem for teeth. My suggestion would be to consume these foods and drinks you enjoy at mealtimes and finish the meal with an alkaline food or xylitol to protect your teeth and gums from damage.
CARIOSTATIC FOODS
When your mouth is healthy, it will feel fantastic. You will quickly find that any snack, drink, or meal can take away this super-clean sensation. My recommendation is not to run for a toothbrush after eating but to dilute and balance mouth acidity as soon as possible, using xylitol or another cariostatic product that can help neutralize acidity and stimulate a flow of saliva to remineralize your teeth. Cariostatic describes a food or ingredient that can actually help stop cavities from forming. Here is a short list of some foods and drinks that help alkalize the mouth and offer tooth-protective and mineralizing benefits.
Chocolate
People have been very confused by the diet fads of the 1980s and often appear to fear good and nutritionally beneficial foods yet embrace things like diet soda or low-fat processed foods, thinking low-fat and diet products are healthy. I have always believed in whole foods and eating in moderation, and now many delicious and nutritious foods, including chocolate, have been shown to have general health and mouth-protective qualities.
The 1954 Vipeholm study by Gustafsson et al. showed that people at high risk for tooth decay could eat dark chocolate and have fewer cavities than people eating comparable amounts of sugar. In 1986, Japanese researchers found that cocoa beans contain an ingredient called theobromine, shown to have cavity-preventing abilities; today, some toothpastes contain this chocolate extract. Of course, some chocolate is heavily sweetened with sugar and other ingredients, so we must apply this chocolate information sensibly into our lives.
Milk and Cheese
One of the most cariostatic foods is whole milk, and whole-milk cheese can be consumed at the end of a meal to protect teeth from cavities. In a 1994 study by Gedalia et al., seven- to nine-year-old children ate a small five-gram piece of Edam cheese after breakfast for two years. At the end of the study, the researchers found significantly fewer cavities in these children than in the control group that did not eat cheese.
We know that milk contains a sugar called lactose, but the only bacteria that can convert lactose to lactic acid are very aggressive kinds of plaque bacteria that have become anaerobic. These specific bacteria can ferment milk, but they are found only in thick, infected plaque that has been stagnant for days. When we drink fresh milk with a healthy mouth, there is no concern. Milk pH is around 7.0, and whole milk contains many helpful fats and nutrients that are protective of teeth. Tooth damage from consuming something acidic or sweet can be mitigated by the calcium and phosphates in milk to reduce enamel damage, as shown in studies by M. E. Thompson et al.
Do not confuse whole and skim milk. The sugar content in skim milk is actually damaging to teeth. If you find whole milk too thick, try diluting it with water rather than using skim milk. This way the fat content remains balanced, and the benefits of whole milk will be preserved. The cream on the top of non-homogenized milk is one product that may stimulate or speed up the formation of healthy biofilm. Consuming or rinsing with this cream may help you if you have a sensitive mouth that may have been stripped of its protective layer by overzealous cleaning; if you have a dry mouth; or after whitening treatments or following oral damage caused by chemotherapy. Here’s an added tip: If your tooth is knocked out in an accident, and you are unable to take it to a dentist for implantation, carry it in a container of saliva, saline solution, cream, or milk to keep it viable for implantation. The quicker this is done, the better!
The following ideas are core to the nutrition and lifestyle strategy I have used to improve mouth health for over thirty years:
•End every meal, snack, or drink with a tooth-protective food, such as xylitol.
•Maintain digestive health, and keep sugar and carbohydrates to a minimum.
•Use xylitol mints or gum each day in conjunction with effective mouth care products to nurture a healthy mouth ecology.
•Don’t sip or snack constantly, but drink at mealtimes, and give your teeth sufficient time between meals to interact with your saliva, every day.
•Eat plenty of vegetables and salads to nourish your body with adequate minerals, and consider adding garlic, mushrooms, and onions to boost your immune system.
•Consider the importance of eating a variety of food-sourced vitamins, especially vitamin C and vitamin D.
•Get plenty of sunshine, relaxation, and exercise to support your immune system.
NUTRITIONAL SUPPLEMENTS
Followers of Weston Price’s ideology figured out some decades ago that sugar had a negative impact on digestive health. They also knew that sugar was only part of the equation and that our body needs vitamins and minerals for healing. Many of these people were concerned about our standard American diet and believed it had become severely deficient in calcium, magnesium, and other vital nutrients necessary to sustain health. There are many theories and different strategies about diet, but most experts will agree on the value of eating real, wholesome foods and the need to include a wide variety from the plant kingdom. Nutritional science is now confirming the wisdom and benefits of this type of diet for superior health.
High-quality, food-derived vitamin and mineral supplements can be a bonus if you are trying to improve your health or if you are experiencing times of stress, especially if you are vegan or nearly vegan or if you eat a limited selection of foods for some reason. I guess, if we lived in a perfect world, supplementation would not be necessary, because we would derive all our daily nutrients from foods. Unfortunately, this may not be possible or practical for some people, and supplements can sometimes fill these gaps. I believe nutritional supplements have been a boon to my clients while they work to change their oral health from a bad state, hoping to make big strides and see rapid improvements. As you begin your journey to improved oral health, I suggest you start by viewing your digestive tract as a vital part of this healing equation and see the process as a kind of top-to-toe internal gardening venture. The strategy for health improvement begins by seeding as wide a variety of healthy digestive bacteria in your gut as possible, and this can be achieved by alternating quality digestive probiotic supplements with a diet rich with plant-based and fermented foods, which will support them. As healthy bacteria flourish, these need to be continually nurtured by a fiber- and vegetable-rich diet. The addition of butter also provides benefits, since butyrate can improve colon health and increase the absorption of nutrients from foods. To heal dental or gum issues and develop ideal oral health, you will need to consider dietary improvements as an addition to your daily oral care and acid-control strategies. Good nutrition can improve the mineralizing capability of your saliva, but this can take time (from weeks to years) to fully manifest, depending on how dysfunctional and damaged your digestive and immune systems have been in the past. You may already have tried to improve your digestive or mouth health, but be encouraged, because working on these areas simultaneously will be far more rewarding and will usually give great results.
THE NEED FOR GOOD BACTERIA
Teeth are a living part of your body, and we should think of them less as a row of stones and more like a coral reef, if we want a better image of why they require nurturing and adequate contact with healthy saliva. Saliva is naturally equipped to supply teeth with the minerals, hydration, proteins, and bacteria they need for health. The bacteria in your mouth live not only on your teeth but also on the skin of your mouth, tongue, and in the oral liquids that make contact with the lining of your nose, ears, and throat. Once we understand that the inside of our body is clothed with an ever-changing but unified ecosystem, it is easier to understand why our digestive, respiratory, and oral health can be either supportive or problematic for other areas of the body.
Today, we know that many microbes, fungi, and virus strains are normal residents in our digestive tract, and many are important contributors to our health. In the dynamics of this ecology, good bacteria usually help control harmful bacterial overgrowth, and there are some microbes that specifically stimulate and strengthen our immune system, the mechanism that controls our body’s ability to repair wounds, fight infection, and detoxify our body to keep us healthy and alive. Achieving a healthy balance of microbes in our digestive tract appears to be central to our well-being and ability to heal.
To change your digestive health, I suggest you consider introducing some food-based vitamin and mineral supplements for a few weeks to support your new developing digestive flora. The direction of change is improved by limiting carbohydrates and sugars at this time and adding as wide a variety of plant-based foods as possible to your diet. If you decide to take probiotic supplements, I suggest you initially target your colon, but remember that all probiotics do not have equal effectiveness, and if you do not see digestive improvement within a few weeks, try using a different brand. It is always good if probiotics are tailored to your gender or age, and it is often good to ask advice from a trusted natural health food counselor or someone who is familiar with the latest research on this topic.
Fermented Foods
The words probiotic food have become synonymous with yogurt because of intense marketing by some yogurt companies. Don’t be misled or let this taint your appreciation of probiotic foods, because there are an incredible number of fermented foods that can supply us with probiotic digestive support. Once again, use small amounts daily, and try to enjoy a varied selection. Fermented foods can be a fabulous addition to your diet if you are looking for improved digestive health. I encourage you to take steps and expand your horizons with fermented foods as you incorporate small amounts of the ones you like into your menu regularly. Here is a list of frequently used fermented foods in the United States:
•Brine pickles (kosher dill)
•Kimchi
•Sauerkraut
•Miso, tempeh, and natto
•Yogurt, kefir, and ryazhenka
•Raw-milk cheese
•Salami and other fermented, dry charcuterie
•Kvass and kombucha
Oral Probiotics
I encourage everyone to realize the importance of healthy oral biofilm and good bacteria in their efforts to naturally heal cavities and gum disease, but I do not generally recommend oral probiotic supplements, because a healthy mouth biofilm will reject new bacteria as intruders. In addition, dental problems usually start with an imbalance in the health of your saliva, and this should be your first focus to resolve tooth or gum problems. Most often, a poor quality saliva is the outcome from many years eating a poor diet or suffering from inadequate digestive absorption. You will not benefit in the long term by simply adding more bacteria to a basically unhealthy mouth. Oral probiotics may offer a temporary benefit if you are unable to improve your mouth health through diet and nutrition, but I suggest the first step for everyone is to develop a healthy pattern of eating and ensure you end every meal, snack, and drink with tooth-protective xylitol or other safe food to limit mouth acidity. Next, you should consider the system of oral care I share in chapter 9, but never think a single paste or rinse is all you need for a healthy mouth. This is why diet and good nutrition, possibly with the addition of nutritional supplements and digestive probiotics, fit into a well-rounded oral health program. The very last resort would be to try an oral probiotic, only if all the other steps have failed.
You should be shocked to know that some oral probiotics that are currently distributed through dental offices are sweetened with artificial sweeteners like sucralose and should be avoided. As mentioned, I recommend oral probiotics only as a last resort for someone who is unable to maintain mouth care or target his or her underlying problems. Look for oral probiotics sweetened with xylitol—included because xylitol feeds healthy, probiotic mouth bacteria. Oral probiotics may offer some help in dire circumstances or if you have an unstable mouth ecosystem because all the grooves in your teeth have been obliterated by dental crowns, fillings, or sealants. The fissures in molar teeth are vital places for healthy mouth bacteria to reside and gain a foothold, and without these footholds, you may have a more changeable mouth ecology and may also experience difficulties digesting gluten and carbohydrates, since these bacteria in molar fissures are primarily responsible for this digestive function.
NEW UNDERSTANDING ABOUT FOODS FOR HEALTH
In the 1960s, most people thought the digestive tract was a tube where food was processed to provide calories as our energy source. Counting calories was fashionable, restricting fat was supposed to be healthy, and if you were sick, doctors prescribed pills to destroy the illness-causing germs. My parents substituted saccharine for sugar and margarine for butter. If they felt slightly sick, the doctor prescribed one of the great new antibiotics or some other pill that they believed was able to miraculously make the sickness “go away.”
Today, we look at these ideas in a new light and know the value of a correct mixture of microbes and that our health and energy are dependent on the work of healthy gut bacteria as they aid digestion and facilitate our body’s absorption of nutrients from foods.These healthy bacteria in our gut have also been shown to influence our brain, our nervous system, how we feel, and even our body’s response to infection and healing. In other words, healthy bacteria affect almost every aspect of wholebody health. This dramatic shift in understanding about our digestion has influenced what a healthy diet should look like and has underscored the importance of fermented, whole, and natural foods; healthy fats; and fiber to support the bacteria involved in the maintenance of our brain, heart, and digestive health. A similar shift now needs to happen as we think of mouth health, so we can move away from the misinformation that most people have believed for the past sixty years and begin to enjoy better oral health.
The Connection between Oral Health and Digestive Health
The most effective way to improve your oral health is to feed, nurture, and support good mouth bacteria and develop healthy oral biofilm. We can achieve this if we can control mouth acidity and improve the quality of our saliva, which is influenced by the nutrients we absorb and the health of our immune system. Body liquids travel in our lymphatic and circulatory systems, and these carry nutrients and cells everywhere around our body (including the tissues that surround our teeth), filtering into the saliva that bathes them. This is why our immune system exerts a big influence and why I advocate some surprising foods for mouth health, including garlic, mushrooms, carrots, onions, pomegranates, dates, and figs. These are wonderful foods to nourish, detoxify, and boost your immune system, which in turn will support the health of your gums and teeth.
Ask anyone in the naturopathic world, and they usually have great respect for healthy digestion, but they often overlook the importance of mouth health. As bacteria have been investigated and cataloged, biofilms have become a new interest, and new facts about them are coming to light and being documented by the Human Microbiome Project. This project has looked at bacteria on skin, in the digestive tract, and in the mouth. Each location appears to have its own kind of ecosystem, supporting special types of bacteria, and researchers have found similarities in biofilms, especially where they interconnect. For example, bacteria in the nose, sinus, ears, and throat are specific to each location, but they are influenced by the composition of bacteria in adjacent ecosystems. This illustrates why it’s impossible to have good oral health if anatomically adjacent areas are unhealthy. In addition, it has become very clear that if your digestion is unhealthy your mouth will be out of balance, and your teeth may become sensitive or weak.
For digestive health, you need a balanced diet, functioning digestive enzymes, and healthy digestive bacteria to turn the food you eat into elements and nutrients that can be absorbed to provide you with the support your body needs. Perhaps the hardest part is to determine the parameters of a balanced diet for ultimate health. My personal advice is to become educated by people who have been successful and who are well informed, and do not let the task be about deprivation or limitations. The truth is that a good diet may simply be to eat real food in moderation with a goal of at least 80 percent of your food plate being a variety of plant foods and vegetables. Once you experience noticeable improvements, it will be easier to be excited about selecting foods for health.
The most noticeable improvements in people’s mouth health usually occur when they improve the health of the two most distant parts of their digestive tract—the mouth and the colon—at the same time. Once the health of these locations has been adjusted, it seems improvements will continue along the remaining portions of their digestive tract in a relatively natural sequence. As the digestive health improves, this may even affect the general health of other areas of the body. For example, someone may experience fewer migraines or headaches, reduced allergies, or less fatigue or joint pain.
As we learned in chapter 3, there are over nine hundred kinds of healthy bacteria found in the mouth, and many of them have important functions. Some of these bacteria, for example, help produce nitric oxide from nitrates in saliva. Nitrates are absorbed from certain things we eat, especially many vegetables and fruits, like celery, lettuce, spinach, strawberries, and beets. The nitrates circulate in the blood and are absorbed into the saliva, which takes them into the mouth, where they are processed by healthy bacteria to create nitric oxide, which has many health benefits. Nitric oxide can enhance breathing and blood flow to the brain and heart, but it also has a mouth-health bonus, as it helps control periodontal pathogens and assists in the development of healthy gums around teeth.
To support all the healthy bacteria in the mouth, we must control acidity. This is one of the main reasons I suggest the journey to oral health begins by consuming a tiny amount of xylitol (a one gram piece of gum or a couple of pure xylitol mints) after every meal, snack, or drink. Xylitol works in a number of ways to improve oral health as it can help control mouth acidity, but it also provides fiber to support healthy digestive bacteria, and it breaks down to form butyrate in the colon, which can improve the health of this part of the digestive tract. Xylitol is hygroscopic, which means that it pulls liquids to itself. This means that when you eat a xylitol mint or piece of pure xylitol gum it will stimulate a flow of natural saliva into your mouth. Healthy saliva nurtures probiotic mouth bacteria and helps to mineralize teeth. The quality of our saliva is affected by the following influences:
•Absorption of minerals from the digestive tract (minerals are carried in blood to saliva, where it is available to mineralize teeth)
•Adequate hydration (water is absorbed from our digestive tract and filters into our bodily fluids, and some will become salivary liquids)
•Adequate nutrient absorption from the digestive tract (nutrients support the cells that heal and rebuild tissues everywhere in the body, including our teeth and gums)
•Colon health (influences the absorption of minerals and nutrients and the health of our immune system, which provides antibodies and cells to fight infection—everywhere in the body)
As you can see from this list, digestive health has an incredible impact on mouth health by providing nutrients and hydration for saliva, support for the healing mechanism that can repair damaged teeth and gums, and the nutrients required to support your body’s defense system that will help fight infection to allow healing to occur. If your teeth and gums are not healing, it is possible you are not absorbing adequate nutrients, or you may have insufficient blood flow to your mouth. Stress can speed up digestion and leave inadequate time for food to be properly processed or for absorption of nutrients into the blood. Hormones can also affect the health of intestinal bacteria and the digestive process. High-carbohydrate diets and artificial sweeteners (especially Splenda) can affect your digestive pH, and upset intestinal health and your body’s ability to absorb nutrients and heal. This is often an undiagnosed problem that can negatively affect the oral and bodily health of someone who is eating a healthy diet yet does not seem to be reaping its benefits.
Throughout life, everything we eat or drink will affect our health and our teeth to some degree. Frequent consumption of sugary foods promotes the conditions that can harm your body and your teeth, and mineral-rich foods have the opposite effect. The outcome for health is what we do regularly, so it really means looking at our normal habits and deciding if they support our health or not. This is also the same process when you have dental problems. You must review your daily habits and decide if they cause more damage than repair each day. If your teeth are sensitive or damaged, then the amount of demineralization your teeth are experiencing outweighs the support that your saliva is providing them for mineralization and repair. The solution is to tip the balance in favor of health by ensuring your habits and diet promote health and that you give your teeth adequate time to interact with undiluted, mineral-rich saliva—an idea we will explore in the next chapter.