While many people think that excellent oral and dental health is all about the mouth, that assumption or notion is not entirely accurate. Your teeth and gums health could also affect the rest of your body, including the heart. Therefore, you must do everything possible to ensure you are on top of your dental and oral health.
Every person is responsible for keeping his/her teeth and gums healthy. That is why people dedicate their time and effort to healthy dental hygiene habits, like tongue scraping, teeth brushing and flossing, and scheduling frequent dental visits.
While these dental hygiene habits help keep your teeth and gums healthy, the food you eat daily is equally crucial in maintaining and improving your dental and general oral health. Excellent dental and oral health requires eating the right foods with the nutrients necessary for a healthy and aesthetically appealing smile.
This article is yours if you are unsure what foods are ideal for oral and dental health. Read on for more insight on the healthy foods you need to incorporate into your diet for a healthy and attractive smile that you and your family deserve.
Different Types of Nutrients You Need for Healthy Gums and Teeth
Before we discuss the different types of foods that you need for healthy gums and teeth, you would want to know which nutrients your body needs for the same. Explained below are the various nutrients your body requires for healthy gums and teeth:
-
Crunchy Foods Rich in Water
Watery, crunchy, and hard foods benefit the health of your gums and teeth in many ways. Aside from triggering your body to produce saliva, which is your body's natural antiseptic neutralizer, these foods help scrap or clean your teeth surfaces when chewing, improving their aesthetic appearance.
-
Phosphorus and Calcium
With time, the acidic foods you eat and the acidic excretions from the bacteria that thrive in your mouth can erode your teeth' enamel, increasing your risk of tooth decay and cavities. Fortunately, foods rich in minerals like calcium and phosphorus can reverse erosion and improve your teeth's strength.
-
Vitamin C
Another vital nutrient you need for healthy gums and teeth is vitamin C, which helps strengthen and reduce inflammation of the blood vessels, ultimately giving you the healthy teeth and gums you deserve.
Vitamin C also plays a critical role in producing a protein known as collagen that helps keep periodontal diseases like gingivitis at bay. Therefore, when you ignore foods rich in this vital nutrient, your gums could become more susceptible to bacterial attack, which causes periodontitis.
-
Vitamin D
As you could be aware, vitamins are vital to your body's overall health. Aside from helping strengthen your bones, vitamin D helps maintain your dental health because it helps your body absorb calcium, which boosts the strength of your teeth.
In addition to the nutrients listed above, the following components or elements are also essential for keeping your gums and teeth healthy:
Probiotics
Some people believe all bacteria are enemies of their health, but that is untrue. Probiotics are good and beneficial bacteria you should have in your body because they help boost the health of your gums and keep plaque at bay.
Antioxidants
Antioxidants play a critical role in maintaining your body's overall health. Specifically, they help keep bacteria that cause tooth decay and periodontal diseases at bay. Antioxidants are also ideal for protecting your gums and other oral tissues from bacterial attacks.
Arginine, Polyphenols and Anthocyanins
Other critical elements your body needs for excellent oral and dental health are arginine, polyphenols, and anthocyanins. Although there is no adequate research regarding these three components, there are credible indications that they could help boost your oral and dental health.
Specifically, anthocyanins help prevent plaque attachment to your teeth's surface and prevent oral cancer. Conversely, polyphenols help slow bacterial growth or multiplication, keeping tooth decay and periodontal diseases at bay. On the other hand, arginine helps disrupt the formation or build-up of decay-causing plaque on the surface of your teeth.
Ideal Foods for Your Dental and Oral Health
Most people know the damage sugary foods like candy, soda, and chocolate can cause to your teeth and gums, but avoiding these foods is not enough. We all need to pay more attention to the foods we swap in our mouths. To that end, some of the foods we should consume more to maintain the health of our gums and teeth include:
Cheese and Yogurt
If you are one of those individuals who profess an undying love for milk products like cheese and yogurt, you now have another reason to enjoy and consume these foods more often. Aside from being soft and easy to consume, eating cheese can raise your mouth's pH and lower the risk of decay.
Another reason why cheese is a friend for your gums and teeth is because it contains a vital protein known as casein, which helps strengthen your teeth's enamel, keeping cavities at bay. If you decide to incorporate yogurt into your diet, it is advisable to choose the plain variety, which has no added sugar.
Leafy Greens
Other super healthy foods you should incorporate into your diet and eat more of are leafy greens like kale, spinach, lettuce, and celery. Although they are low in calories, these leafy greens contain crucial nutrients like vitamin C and minerals like calcium and magnesium, which help strengthen your teeth's enamel.
Leafy greens also contain folic acid, which helps reduce gum inflammation and prevent periodontal diseases. Although some of these leafy vegetables are best eaten raw, you can cook them to add taste and benefit from their nutritional content.
Unlike snack foods like candy and chocolate, these healthy alternatives help boost saliva production. As mentioned above, adequate saliva in your mouth will help neutralize tooth-damaging acids that cause cavities.
Other Vegetables
While the leafy greens mentioned above are vegetables, they lack some important nutrients that you can find in other vegetables like squash, butternut, and broccoli. These vegetables contain lentinan, an important antibacterial compound that can help fight bacteria and disrupt plaque build-up on the surface of your teeth, reducing the chances of developing cavities.
Green Tea
Are you aware that the bacteria in your mouth feed on sugary foods that linger in your mouth, releasing acidic secretions that cause enamel erosion? Fortunately, green tea contains an essential element known as polyphenols, which suppress and kill these plaque-causing bacteria.
Another reason green tea is advisable for your dental and oral health is because it contains catechin, an antioxidant that helps reduce inflammation of your gums and combat periodontal diseases. By protecting the bone structures that support and anchor your teeth, green tea helps boost your oral health.
Fish
Incorporating fish into your diet can help you maintain and improve your dental and oral health. Fish like salmon contain essential nutrients like oils, vitamin D, and Omega-3, which enable you to stay on top of your dental health. Omega-3 are critical fats that play a critical role in preventing gum and periodontal diseases.
Most dentists recommend eating fish or taking Omega-3 supplements after a gum disease treatment because they help speed up recovery.
On the other hand, vitamin D helps your body absorb calcium, which is a critical mineral that helps strengthen your teeth' enamel. Without these crucial nutrients, your body cannot absorb and utilize calcium. Therefore, incorporating fatty fish like mackerel or salmon into your diet could be a simple and tasty solution for keeping your teeth and gums healthy.
Lean Meat
Generally speaking, most meats, particularly lean meats like beef and chicken, provide your body with the essential nutrients mentioned above. Chicken contains collagen, which has anti-inflammatory effects that help prevent the degradation of your gum tissues, keeping gum diseases at bay. Lean meat is also an excellent source of protein, which helps boost the health of your gums and teeth.
Another reason why lean meat is an ideal food for your dental and oral health is because it contains phosphorus, which is a critical mineral that helps in bone production. Failing to incorporate phosphorus-rich foods into your diet could make your teeth weak and more prone to breaking and chipping, even if you already have enough vitamin D and calcium in your body.
Raisins and Cranberries
Like green tea, cranberries contain polyphenols, which provide antioxidant benefits. Fresh cranberries can help disrupt the process of plaque formation and build-up, combating tooth decay and gum diseases. However, you should beware that some packaged cranberries contain added sugar, which is an enemy to your dental and oral health.
Raisins are another healthy food that can help promote dental and oral health because they contain antioxidants that help prevent gum diseases. Raisins also contain phytochemicals like oleanolic acid, which helps suppress the growth and multiplication of oral bacteria, the leading cause of gum disease and cavities.
Seeds and Nuts
Seeds and nuts like cashews, Brazil nuts, and almonds are rich in crucial nutrients that help boost your dental and oral health, including phosphorus and calcium. Nuts and seeds also help balance pH levels in your mouth because they stimulate saliva production when chewing them.
However, you should chew your nuts carefully because they have rough and pointy edges that could injure or irritate the soft tissues in your mouth, like the gums.
Apples
Those crunchy fibers that apples have when eaten are more like a toothbrush because they help clean your teeth surface, keeping plaque and cavities at bay. Like seeds and nuts, chewing apples also stimulates saliva production, which has numerous benefits, including neutralizing the harmful acidity in your mouth.
Garlic
Garlic remains a common and essential household vegetable, but most individuals are unaware of its oral health benefits. Specifically, garlic has antiseptic properties that help protect your gums from periodontal diseases.
Ginger
Many individuals consider ginger as one of the spices critical to a delicious meal. However, this spice has several additional benefits for your gums and teeth. Some of these benefits include (but are not limited to) the following:
- It helps keep cavities at bay.
- It helps strengthen your teeth.
- It helps remove plaque build-up from the surface of your teeth and below the gum line.
- It helps keep inflammatory gum diseases at bay.
- It helps lessen the chances of gum diseases.
- It helps prevent oral cancer.
Onions
Although raw onions can cause bad breath, they have several oral health and dental benefits, including keeping cavities and gum diseases at bay due to their antimicrobial properties.
Shiitake Mushrooms
Like onions, shiitake mushrooms contain antibacterial and antimicrobial properties, which help combat gum diseases and cavities. These properties also help prevent gingivitis, which can progress to become a periodontal disease when left untreated.
Red Wine
Many people enjoy sipping wine because it is tasty, but most are unaware of its benefits for their teeth and gums. Like green tea and cranberries, red wine contains polyphenols (antioxidants), which help prevent plaque build-up on the surface of your teeth.
While it can help promote healthy gums and teeth, you should limit your intake of red wine because of its staining properties, which can affect the aesthetic appearance of your smile.
Water
Last but not least, you cannot ignore the importance of water for your dental and oral health. Here are the oral and dental health benefits of water that you ought to know:
- Drinking an adequate amount of water could help prevent bad breath, also known as halitosis.
- Drinking water will also help wash away and remove food particles from the spaces between your teeth.
- Drinking an adequate amount of water can also help hydrate your gums.
- Drinking water can also lower acidity in your mouth after eating acidic foods.
- Drinking plenty of water also helps prevent dry mouth condition.
The sooner you incorporate the above healthy foods into your diet, the better to prevent unnecessary oral and dental health issues.
Find a Seasoned Dentist Near Me
If you are unsure of the ideal food to incorporate into your diet for healthy teeth and gums, you should consult an experienced dentist. A balanced diet of various healthy foods can help you stay on top of your dental and oral health.
We invite you to call our courteous and experienced dentists at Lasting Impressions Dental Spa at 818-751-5100 if you have any dental or oral health concerns in Encino.
