How to Naturally Whiten Your Teeth | Dr. Staci Whitman & Dr. Andrew Huberman

00:00:00.000 | what makes teeth white and will supporting the oral microbiome make our teeth whiter yeah and

00:00:07.840 | by the way there are some folks out there whose teeth need to be less white in my opinion agree

00:00:11.800 | totally agree now we're being somewhat facetious but not really um but i think most people would

00:00:17.780 | like to have teeth that are uh would be uh characterized as mostly white yeah we want to

00:00:23.780 | look good i mean i appreciate and respect that i do think we've moved a little away from reality

00:00:28.400 | with some of that so i agree with you i think there's there are um teeth out there that could

00:00:35.120 | could not be quite so bright but you do you i think everyone should do what makes them happy

00:00:40.060 | so what makes teeth white so interestingly if you look at a baby tooth next to an adult tooth and i

00:00:47.100 | get this call all of the time from parents so the child loses their first baby tooth the adult tooth

00:00:52.640 | starts to come in and adult teeth are quite a bit darker than baby teeth which are very white and

00:00:58.320 | bright and they're worried what's wrong with my child's teeth they're so yellow that's actually

00:01:02.900 | a very natural shade of enamel and why is that it all has to do with that crystalline structure in the

00:01:08.620 | mineralization so baby teeth are less mineralized and the crystalline structure is a little more

00:01:14.320 | haphazardly arranged it's not quite as organized so instead of like lincoln logs lined up it's more like

00:01:20.580 | pickup sticks to some degree why is that baby teeth are meant to resorb dissolve and fall out okay so this is why

00:01:28.240 | baby teeth are also much more susceptible to decay so the whiteness is coming how the light reflects

00:01:35.520 | and refracts off the teeth which is a lot of times while you why you hear if you use hydroxyapatite

00:01:41.420 | or even coconut oil is changing the surface surface modification so it's changing the way light reflects

00:01:48.940 | and refracts off that tooth to make it seem whiter and brighter now certainly with adult teeth if you're

00:01:53.940 | using bleaching agents you know hydrogen peroxide or um carbon mine peroxide some of the stronger

00:02:00.280 | bleaching that's actually penetrating into the tooth and changing the structure pulling out stain do people

00:02:06.240 | do that they gargle with hydrogen peroxide well they do bleaching trays essentially um i don't well people

00:02:11.860 | will rinse with hydrogen peroxide yes and it will make your teeth brighter and whiter but i'm telling you

00:02:17.120 | it's going to do a number on your oral microbiome so i suggest it very in a very limited fashion the only

00:02:22.940 | time i ever had a bad canker sore was because i gargled with um 50 water 50 hydro hydrogen peroxide

00:02:32.940 | because an acupuncturist recommended it i he looked at my tongue and then he said you should do that you

00:02:39.600 | know and then i did that and then you know four or five days later i had this like you know nickel sized

00:02:45.340 | canker sore on the roof of my mouth and i was like oh and um i will say and i have no product

00:02:51.120 | affiliation whatsoever but um to any any specific products by but by switching to hydroxyapatite

00:02:57.120 | containing toothpaste my teeth they definitely have gotten whiter i drink a lot of yeah yerba mate and

00:03:03.720 | coffee and um and i brush but that that was it it was it was sort of a progressive issue of my teeth

00:03:10.120 | dimming um so that's been been great i also used to get cavities fairly often when i was a kid we i'll

00:03:16.780 | talk about that a little bit later um but since switching to hydroxyapatite toothpaste i've had like

00:03:22.100 | stellar um dental reviews assuming my dentist is looking carefully i believe he is but we'll see

00:03:28.200 | and to me it just makes so much more sense like give teeth the mineral that they normally use to re

00:03:32.900 | mineralize um it just makes sense like it's biomimetic it depends on how you look at life

00:03:39.800 | i think i prefer biomimetic materials personally it's again it's a personal choice but i agree with

00:03:46.820 | you my patients who have switched to hydroxyapatite and i'd like to point out not all hydroxyapatite

00:03:52.220 | toothpaste are the same it depends on sourcing and the other ingredients that are in there but

00:03:58.520 | generally speaking their teeth look healthier stronger whiter and brighter they're they just

00:04:04.620 | look more nourished more hydrated their microbiomes look more balanced too you're talking about kids

00:04:10.560 | and the fact that sometimes if their teeth are a little bit yellow that's normal one thing um that

00:04:15.840 | i've been really struck by as the discussion around longevity seems more and more prominent these days

00:04:20.760 | is um occasionally i'll run into somebody who's in their 70s or 80s um even 90s and it's very rare

00:04:29.180 | to encounter somebody in their 80s or 90s whose teeth are not like the color of this tea and for those that

00:04:35.120 | are listening it's like a very dark brown um i've never seen somebody unless they're doing something

00:04:40.500 | highly artificial with bleaching um i've never seen somebody 75 or older whose teeth aren't basically

00:04:49.840 | yellow to brown darker and when you look at people when they're very close to death their teeth often

00:04:54.800 | look uh very opaque uh what is that is that a blood flow issue is it um what's going on there yeah it can

00:05:01.760 | be a zero stoma dry mouth so we definitely lose salivary capabilities as we age very likely more

00:05:09.340 | mouth breathing so mouth breathers will tend to have darker teeth because the teeth desiccate they dry

00:05:14.580 | out and over time you will experience mineral loss um decades and decades of coffee tea wine will do it

00:05:22.680 | too well i don't drink the wine but i'm definitely coffee tea since i was a little kid i've been drinking

00:05:28.060 | bata since i was like five it's good yeah it's delicious yeah gotta live life yeah but um yeah

00:05:34.240 | and so they're and they they're losing minerals too you know over time your teeth take a beating i mean

00:05:39.080 | they're we're living to be a hundred now that's a long time to maintain this non-shedding surface in

00:05:45.060 | our body you know so um and then it depends on the generation too but some some generations especially

00:05:51.560 | as you mentioned 70s 80s i'd wonder about tetracycline exposures when there's certain

00:05:57.580 | antibiotics that we don't use anymore that can um were known to darken the teeth which is why they

00:06:02.140 | pulled them from common prescription

00:06:04.700 | which is why they're living to darken the teeth which is why they're living to darken the teeth which is why they're

00:06:08.900 | living to darken the teeth which is why they're living to darken the teeth which is why they're living to darken the teeth

00:06:11.000 | which is why they're living to darken the teeth which is why they're living to darken the teeth which is why they're living to darken the teeth

How to Naturally Whiten Your Teeth | Dr. Staci Whitman & Dr. Andrew Huberman

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