Dr. Sanda Moldovan explains why overusing antibacterial mouthwash damages your mouth: you need the good bacteria. Use antimicrobials only for cavities or gum disease, pair them with diet and stress changes, and try natural options like Trialergy. Plain water in an oral irrigator works fine.
Hi everyone, I'm Dr. Sanda. Welcome to my channel. I wanted to talk to you a little bit about antimicrobial. So I get this question a lot. Well, I want to kill the bacteria that I have in the mouth. You know, I want to use all this antibacterial stuff and that's not okay. And why is that? We do need the friendly bacteria in the mouth. We have good bacteria and then we have bad bacteria. The good bacteria is really present to actually protect us against the bad bacteria. But the problem with antimicrobials such as mouthwashes with really potent, potent chemicals are not good for us. It's going to kill every single bacteria in your mouth. And then what you're going to find is that your mouth gets really sensitive and potentially could cause sores in the mouth. So take it easy with the antibacterials. If you have cavities or gum disease, inflammation, yes. Then that's a good time when to use antibacterials. So, for example, cavities and gum disease are caused by bad bacteria. But what happens is if the only thing we're doing is use antibacterials and we don't do any lifestyle changes like as diet modifications, stress reduction, then all these bad bacteria are going to come right back and we're really just putting a band aid on a big fire. It's not going to work. However, for those times that you do need to use an antibacterial, I recommend more natural things. I am not a fan of chemicals in the mouth and especially nothing that has alcohol in it. In my office I use something called Trialergy, which is a debriding serum and it's aloe vera based and it has amazing essential oils with very potent antibacterial effect. This product has actually been tested scientifically in comparison with some of the chemical products that we traditionally were using, and it has done better than those chemical products. So I do advise you to use something more natural if you need an antibacterial as it's not toxic to our cells. But keep it down with the antibacterials. Once you have a lifestyle change and your mouth gets healthier, brushing and flossing will take care of the bacteria. So for flossing, if you use the oral irrigator, you do not need to use any antibacterials in it, as all of the studies were done just with water. I hope this answered your question and if you have any questions, please tweet me @doctorsanda or go to my website and send me a message@drsandamoldovan.com until next time, keep flossing.
