Your Oral Microbiome & Mental Health: The Overlooked Link with Dr. Namrata Patel | Ep 150

Hi everybody. Have you ever wondered how your mouth might impact your mental health? In today's episode, we dive deep into the oral microbiome. We talk about root canals, mouth breathing, and we even peek into the ever controversial topic of fluoride. Friend or foe, you decide.

We are interviewing Dr. Nami Patel. She's a graduate from University of California's School of Dentistry, and she's a leading figure in holistic dentistry. She was born in India, and she immigrated to the US at a young age and has become a champion for integrating environmental awareness into dental care. So she's all about holistic dental care for our bodies as well as for the world and the environment. She's a published author and she's an advocate for the vital connection between dental health and overall wellbeing. She also supports various community and environmental organizations and reflects her dedication to both patient care and global sustainability. This episode is jam-packed and we are so excited to share it with you. Shall we get into it?

Let's do it. I'm so glad that you're here. And my first question is, can you tell us about the link between the bugs in your mouth, your oral microbiome, and our brain and our mood?

Absolutely. That is a great question to know about how the bugs in our mouth influence our moods and influence the way we feel, our energy levels, even some actually anxiety and sometimes even forgetting stuff, right? Which stresses us all out. So one of the things that happens with our oral microbiome is that we have good bacteria, bad bacteria, and there's a lot of bad bacteria that actually tends to be around the mouth. And you could be flossing every single day and you might have them in your mouth. And isn't that like a little scary, right? We never know. So we want to test these bugs and we find that if there is these specific bacteria, we call them red light bacteria because it's the ones that we don't want. They tend to cause an inflammatory response. So what it does, and it makes our immune system work harder, and it's that low-grade infection almost, which uses our reserves and our energy, which is the reason why we have the low moods, because your body is busy fighting a battle. It's not resting and digesting, trying to make you happy. It's really, you know, on the battlefield trying to get rid of these bacteria. Because these bacteria actually are really pathogenic and they actually cause a lot of systemic issues like heart attacks, diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer's, and all sorts of stuff like that. So oral microbiome is super important in managing your moods and really making sure that you have good bugs in your mouth and that actually helps you feel elevated because that's what good bugs actually do. They do help you feel really good. Now, I do want to point out something else, and I know I'm probably rambling a little bit, but I'm so excited to talk about this, so I can't help it. So the reason why these bacteria are so problematic is because you're swallowing 5 gallons of these guys every single day.

What? 5 gallons?

That's right. 5 gallons. So I know it's a dire picture, but can you imagine your body just swallowing 5 gallons of these bugs in your stomach? Right. So now you've got these Bugs in your mouth and then go in your stomach and you can't digest the food like you normally do. That influences our mood. So we really want to look at these things, right? We really want to look at the gut-brain axis too. This is the oral mouth and the brain axis and the emotional axis, but really it influences other parts as well that we really want to be mindful of. And it's also something that people aren't really talking about. They're not connecting the dots. And so I want to connect the dots here so that we can look at how the oral microbiome is related to our moods. It's related to our brain function, but so is our stomachs, because from here it's going to here. It's going from our mouths into our belly straight, 5 gallons every single day without us even trying.

Oh, my gosh. Hadz, I know you're bursting at the seams with questions. I love it.

Yeah. Will you tell us a little bit about how— what the difference is between a holistic dentist and, you know, just a dentist that doesn't have the holistic part involved? Because I think that this, this is something that I've been so excited to interview you about. Totally. Because I get so frustrated, like, when I'm at the dentist or when I, you know, talk to, talk to dentists or whatever. And I feel like they're only treating the mouth. And so I would love to hear about how, obviously, your oral microbiome is a big factor here, but how is it that you help treat the whole person through their mouth?

That's such a great question. Thank you so much. So one of the things that we have to look at as a holistic dentist, and I call myself more of a green dentist versus just a holistic dentist, because I went to dental school and And then I went out and I went to functional medicine training. I've studied Ayurveda. I've studied so many different things and things like that. Because one of the most common misconceptions, really, is that if somebody doesn't place mercury, they'll be like, I'm a holistic dentist.

Yes, I have definitely had many experiences like that.

Yes. And that's a bunch of caca, right? That's not the only thing we're dealing with. We got to look at a lot more stuff, and we've got to look at current data. 20 years ago, if you said you didn't place Mercury in your whole state. Fantastic. But now there's been so much research that's been done, and I always say there's 2 most important ways. And we touched on the microbiome for a second. That's just the surface. Now, the second thing we really want to look at is functional breathing. And we want to look at functional breathing because obviously it's going to help with our mental awareness and our mental stability, as well as it's going to impact so many other things in the rest of our bodies. Because mouth breathing is a serious concern. It happens to to us when we are, you know, not breastfed or have had teeth extractions. And also it happens in older age. It's part of the process as we get older because our tongue muscle, normally it's nice and tight, but after 40s we start getting wrinkles. So does our tongue. As that happens, we start snoring. And that is first thing I always hear patients say is, I am so anxious all the time. I'm so anxious. It's because they're not getting enough air. That's one of the root problems that we see, and it's a structural issue.

I love that answer. Thank you so much for that. I'm so fascinated. I had no idea that your tongue weakens with age, and that's why so many people have snoring later on in their lives. That's amazing. Okay. So something that we were talking about that Dr. Kane and I were talking about before we hopped on here is that, well, you can tell them about your oral, your orthodontia. And so, yeah, go ahead. Go ahead.

Well, here's what happens. We're a tooth-conscious society and we're into looking good and feeling good. And I'm all about that for sure. It's just that I don't want to compromise. I want to look beautiful and I want to be natural and I want to make sure my body works really well. So one of the things that happens is that we're such a tooth-conscious society because of Hollywood and Instagram or whatever, you know. And what happens with children is that they're still developing. So if they're still developing, if we jam braces on them, what happens is that they're still growing, but their teeth are jammed shut. As you know, the teeth are into the bones here, and all of these bones are connected to other bones. So if this is restricted, it will not allow sinus breathing or nose breathing to occur, which creates a product called nitric oxide. Nitric oxide naturally helps you heal, and we want that. And as you know, what's the first thing they tell you when you feel anxiety? Breathe.

Breathe.

Right. Breath. The breath is a form of life. It is a source of life. It's a source of our healing. And in yogis— and I come from India, so in Indian culture, the reason why they live such a long time is because they're doing so much breathwork. And now we have Wim Hof, we have Buteyko breathing. There's so many different breathing that we're doing, and all of it is designed to create good products that our bodies can naturally use to feel better. So if somebody's had braces when they were growing, it didn't allow the sinus cavity to grow properly. And then on the bottom jaw was jammed shut, so their windpipe didn't grow properly. And then those patients, we usually find sleep apneas in their 40s and 50s. So again, it's a progression that happens. It starts in childhood. It's not really a big concern. Then it gets worse and worse and worse over time. The patients that I see that have the most traumatic experiences with this is if they have had teeth extracted. If they have teeth extracted, usually about 2 years later is when they'll start complaining about headaches or have some sort of autoimmune dysfunction or have gut dysbiosis, have some sort of an issue that occurs. And it's because your body is doesn't have the amount of oxygen that it used to, and it no longer can function as well as it used to. So that is a huge issue. And I have a lot of patients that come to me when they're younger because they're like, you know, I've had headaches forever and I don't know why. I've tried everything. It hasn't gone away. The teeth extractions are really, really, really detrimental.

Can you tell us a little bit more about why that is? Because both Dr. Kane and I have had many, many teeth extractions.

So what happens with teeth extractions is that, number one, as I was saying, just the braces are going to jam the jaw shut, right? If you have teeth extraction, it actually not only— it actually makes your carrying capacity or your volume of air that you can get much smaller because your sinus cavities can't develop. It actually is even constricted because the teeth that were supposed to be there, they were supposed to be there to hold space. But if you take those teeth out and then you squish things in even more, it creates a huge issue. So that is— we usually find grinding on these patients. We usually like gum line fillings, gum recession. All of these things are a result of teeth being extracted and leading to a lot of different problems. And like I said, the biggest ones we find is anxiety. Anxiety and depression. Because that low grade, when you can't sleep, and yet because your tongue doesn't have enough space, what happens is when the teeth are extracted, I said the sinus cavity is small. That's one part. Now, the second part is that you're restricting the bone with braces, right? Even if you have teeth extracted and stuff. But your tongue is a muscle, so the muscle is going to continue to grow. So what really happens is that the tongue is too big for the mouth.

Mm-hmm.

So when the tongue is too big for the mouth, what happens is when you lay down to try to sleep, you can't sleep because— and you're not getting that nitric oxide when you breathe through the nose. And also, you're not getting that REM sleep. REM is really when your body restores itself. And, you know, that's really what we're looking for. A lot of times we find patients with ADHD who have an airway breathing issue as well, all because of teeth extractions. And, you know, they're Functional airway is restricted.

So does this happen for if you have baby teeth extracted, or is it only if it's adult teeth that are extracted?

Usually it's adult teeth. So thank God for the baby teeth. Yes. The baby teeth sometimes need to come out. It's no big deal. The other risk factors are also if children are not breastfed for 2 years. So if you guys have children, make sure breastfeed for 2 years because that, as the baby is suckling on the breast, It actually develops that functional airway much better. As that functional airway is much better, you know, you'll find that learning is better. You know, the child's gonna be more calmer. It's much, much, much, much better for the child long-term. So.

So what I'm wondering about is how we're— so we know that correlation does not imply causation, and we know that lots of people have had dental work done, like you were saying in the beginning of our conversation, is we live in a very tooth-conscious, forward-facing society, especially here in the US. And so you have all these people who've had braces and teeth pulled and orthodontia and all these people who have anxiety. And so what we, what we want to do is bridge the gap and identify that, yes, this could be a root cause factor. And so I imagine that part of how we're bridging that gap is because When you guys go in and you correct that, that people's experiences are better. So I was wondering if you could speak more on that.

Oh, absolutely. That is actually really fun to talk about because one of the things I'll have to say is majority of the time, people don't like to tell us that they have anxiety. Nobody wants to bring that up. It's almost like a hush-hush. It's almost like there's shame that's involved with anxiety. And it's not until I ask about it, they're like, hey, Do you happen to feel anxious on the inside? Because we are also— we have to present ourselves in front of people, right? We're used to composing ourselves. And we're doctors. So when we're forward-facing with our patients, there's a persona. And there's a way that we are. And that inner feeling of that anxiousness that everyone kind of deals with and doesn't really like to talk about it. And so I actually bring that up in the conversation. And they're like, how did you know? That's the first thing that they'll tell me. I also see scalloping on their tongue. There's indentations on their tongue, which will tell me the tongue doesn't have enough space. I'll see that. And then also a lot of times when they're speaking, I'll see just a lot of tongue. So you see when I'm speaking, you can see a lot of my teeth. When people are speaking, all I will see is their tongue. And I know that tongue doesn't have enough space or there's a tongue tie or something along those lines. So I usually find patients with those signs and symptoms. Then we start talking a little bit more. Hey, any ADHD, any sort of restless leg syndrome, any underlying things that maybe we haven't talked about? And then they start opening up about some trauma maybe in the past or some anxiety that they're dealing with and things like that. Then we'll look at doing an analysis. We'll do our treatment. And I always do a medical history before we start the treatment. And then we do the treatment. Usually takes some time to do the treatment. Then I'll do another medical history again. And they'll forget what they wrote, right? Because it's like now, like, some time has passed. And it's so surprising. They come back like completely different people. They come back with so much joy. They come back with so much ease. And, you know, I'm not saying this is the only way, but what I do know about life is that it's tough. And there's always gonna be something that's gonna cause, you know, for us to be anxious about, right? What I like to do is structurally we increase the capacity to be able to deal with it. And that's what we want to do so that the body can function really well on its own. And so when we're looking at something like this, we're looking at your overall body so it doesn't turn into disease. Because prolonged anxiety, 2 years of that is going to lead to hypothyroidism. You put out your— I mean, common thing that we see in stress 18 months of stress is going to— the first place we'll go is hypothyroidism. Now, after that autoimmune condition starts, it's a sequence of 3. You either see eczema come around, you also see something else come around, arthritis come around maybe 10 years later. So it's always that sequence, right? So if we can get the body to work well on its own, giving that nitric oxide, helping it stay in the rest and digest mode, it's going to be able to work much, much, much better and be preventative with disease and dysfunction. And I'm not saying that all anxiety is going to go away because that's not true, but because we're going to have stressful situations, right? And that's why sometimes we have to use different techniques like the ones you have in your courses that we need to be able to manage. But all we want to do is just make it easier. And also, if we can find ways to help our bodies be more comfortable and be at ease, that's really ultimately what we try to do as a holistic dentist.

I love it. So yeah.

What does the treatment look like specifically? You were talking about these structural airway issues. So what is the treatment?

Well, let me show you what I'm talking about. So I'll show you some examples. And earlier you had asked me about some patients and said, hey, you know what? I'm sure you've had people say certain things, you know? So I'm gonna share my screen here and I'm gonna share with you a couple or one example I would say of someone that I can share with you that kind of goes through this information. So let me do that. I'm going to share my screen here if I can figure out how. Or can I get permission to share? Is that okay?

Yes, please. Yeah, I give you sharing permission.

Okay, perfect. Thank you. So this is, um, I'm going to, you know, share someone here that, uh, you know, I have. And so this is somebody we started with, came into me and said, hey, you know, I'm breaking my teeth all the time, I have low-grade anxiety, I can't run, um, I'm really exhausted, I'm really frustrated that I have IBS. I have all these other concerns. And I was like, okay, well, let's take a look. So we did a CT scan. The first thing we realized is she had braces. And then also looking at her, you can see here that her tongue doesn't have enough space. And her functional airway was only a 7.9. Her normal is about a 10. So we decided to do treatment. And this is what she looks like 2 years later. You can see the functional airway increased to 13, from a 7.9 to 13 millimeters. So her windpipe is increased, which is constricted by the braces on the lower jaw. And then the tongue now that didn't— couldn't latch onto the roof of the palate. So she'd go, right? So now what we've done is open and widen that palate so that the tongue can have enough space. So that way, what this does is in a lot of yoga, the one first thing they tell you to do is put your tongue at the roof of the palate. The reason why they do that, it actually helps you relax. So if your tongue is naturally resting at the roof of the palate all the time, the way it should be, you're naturally going to be at more ease, and it's naturally going to help your vagus nerve, your rest and digest nerve, to work properly. Okay. The other thing I find with a lot of these patients is ringing in the ears or TMJ problems. So the reason why that's an issue is because the majority of the people who have constricted airways are also grinding their teeth, right, in the jaw joint, the vagus nerve exits the cranium there. So a lot of times we find ringing in the nerves, which is the auditory nerve. And then the rest and digest nerve tends to get— it tends to get constricted. So we find that once we start expanding the upper and the lower jaw, remember, when I'm expanding the upper jaw, I'm not just expanding the upper jaw, I'm expanding the sinus. I'm expanding this. I'm expanding all the valves. When I'm doing that, it's going to help get rid of headaches. It's going to help get rid of being tired, fatigue, grinding. It helps with so many other things as well as our moods and our energy and our capacity to deal with stress.

Amazing.

Yeah. So when you're talking about how you're creating all of this space and stuff, how do you actually do that for the patient?

So there's a really great book. It was called Breath. It was a big seller. I don't know if you guys ever read it. So, you know, I was actually blessed to work with Dr. Belfort before he passed. So he actually trained me to be able to do this kind of work. So it's usually an appliance that we utilize. It looks kind of like this. It looks like a little retainer almost. But the beauty of it is, is we know in the roots of our teeth there's actually stem cells that we can utilize. We can activate the bone-making cells. To activate more bone, so we can undo all the damage that braces did. So we can actually expand the upper arch, and we can expand the lower arch. And the CT scan I showed you, so as soon as we expand the upper arch right here, as we make this wider, the sinus cavity is going to go bigger. And then on the bottom jaw, as we expand this, the windpipe becomes bigger. So even like a two millimeter change or a millimeter of change in your windpipe is a hundred fold, right? Because it's a circle. So the amount of air people get, it just changes dramatically. And I always make a bet, 90 days, if I don't make you feel good, I will give you a bottle of wine. Because I'm a big wine person.

So what I hear you saying is that we have these developing brains and bones and teeth and tongue and mouth. And then so many of us end up getting orthodontics, which largely pulls things and straightens things into the midline. And I really resonate with that. I had my first retainer in 3rd grade, and then I had a white brick at one point that I had to bite. I had lockjaw later in my life, and I had braces through I was 21, and I've been chronically congested my entire life. And live on Afrin. It's the only way that I can breathe is Afrin. And so I've seen so many different doctors and they're just like, I don't know what to tell you. Take this steroid nasal spray and these anti-allergy medications. And so then, so arguably we would have to look at imaging, but arguably my airways have been pulled together and shrunk. And so that's why it feels like I can't breathe through my nose at all. And what you're describing is there's a device that you have custom fit for people to then widen their palate, their upper and their lower palate, and then that can create more space in their airways. Am I kind of tracking?

You're absolutely tracking. And even more than this, so the device that we specifically use are also designed to, yes, expand your upper and your lower palate, but Secondly, puts you in the rest and digest mode. There's a lot of different devices out there. There are certain devices that are active force, so they're just constantly putting pressure on you, and that's not good for your body. So the type of devices that we do are actually just like you inhale and exhale. We activate, deactivate, activate, deactivate. So it gets into that rhythmic circadian rhythm. And that's why we find patients like, hey, my IBS is no longer active, or, oh my God, I'm in remission now. Or like, oh my God, I can breathe through my nose really really well. And oh my God, my anxiety is so much better. And oh my God, my headaches are gone. All of those things happen is because we're putting your body into rest and digest. It's not active, it's all passive. And our body daily functions need to be autonomic, just like our heart rate is. It's something we don't want to think about. We want our bodies to be able to do that naturally on their own.

So what I hear is you're not shooting the body into sympathetic by putting a lot of pressure because then it's not going to hold. And so it sounds like it's kind of like a pulsing rhythmic thing. So are people able to then after treatment no longer require a device anymore? Like, everybody in the world has a retainer. Everybody is like, they go on their Tinder date and they bring their retainer and they bring their toothbrush. Is that something that people can enjoy then? Is that once they've had the treatment, they don't need to use a retainer anymore?

Absolutely. Because one of the things we add into our treatment is something called myofunctional therapy, which is tongue training exercises. So remember we talked about the lazy tongue where you can just see the tongue every time they're talking, right? So what we've done is design myofunctional therapy. So those therapies are basically exercises that put the tongue in the right place. And what we can now do, that tongue acts as a retainer.

That's amazing.

Wow.

And so with my person, this is all about me apparently. And so they ended up pulling. So I had all these retainers, all these braces, and they've pulled out all but 2 of my baby teeth. They pulled over like 4 at a time, and then they ended up pulling these 2 teeth and there were no adult teeth. And so these are, I have a Maryland bridge on each side. And so because of that, I noticed everybody's teeth. And I talk to people about their teeth. And so there's so many people, they're like, should I get implants? Should I have my bridge removed? And I remember when I was wanting to do nasal cranial release— for those who are listening, it's where you can stick a balloon up the nose and try to open the airway— but then I was worried because I have this bridge, and then you have the bones in the skull, they're moving, and then the bridge might not fit anymore. So Can you talk to me about people who have the wonderful gift of either implants or bridges and what that would look like?

So if you have implants or bridges, we're talking about this specific expansion. I still do it on patients. So one of the things is if you had teeth extracted, you're going to end up with some spacing. And then we do Invisalign or something to close it because we're growing bone first, right? We're talking about all skeletal structures. So we got to get everything in proper shape first. And I love that you've done a nasocranial release. I love doing the nasocranial release. Cranial release with some ozone. It works like a charm, especially if you're congested all the time. Some ozone injections in there over a period of time will kill off fungus, anything that's up there, and keep you more open, which will be amazing. The other thing is that when you actually expand, you're expanding the bone, right? And so there will be— so braces tips teeth, right? And unless you're growing, then it doesn't allow everything else to grow. But as adults, what's going to happen is that there will be some spaces, which is fine. we can always close it up with a little bit of Invisalign or something like that. It's usually pretty quick and easy. And honestly, like the case I showed you, that person didn't even end up with extra spacing. There are some patients, depending on their tongue and what their body needs, it'll end up with spacing and then we can close it up. If you have implants or bridges, no big deal. We can still expand you and we just design the appliances in specific ways so that it doesn't harm the bridges or the implants or anything like that. And I'm so happy to hear that you had a Maryland bridge It's super conservative. I'm really happy. So that's fantastic. And we want to keep them as long as possible.

Yeah.

You know what I mean? That's great. That's fantastic. But this is a great way if you decided you wanted to put some implants for stuff, if we wanted to create space even as an adult, we can still do that.

So what are your thoughts about implants? I've talked to some people, some holistic dentists. I know you identify more as green dentists. Some holistic dentists talk about acupuncture meridians and how when you're putting a metal implant, that that can change the flow of energy. And it's not my zone of genius, but I think about that with braces or root canals or implants, things that are going into the structure of the bone. What do you think about

that? There's meridians, absolutely. And it's really important to look at meridians, especially when they're related, especially because root canals, right? The reason why root canals are such a problem is is that root canals can get foci of infection if they're not done right. And then remember the red light bacteria I talked about at the beginning? That's what they overgrow. And that's that low-grade infection that leads to IBS or cancer or anything like that. So I can see the concern with root canal teeth and holistic dentists and all this other stuff. But when it comes to implants, it's a completely different story. The reason is now we have so much science and data Proven here. The first thing I would do is if you came to me and said, "Hey, I want to do implants," the first thing I would do is I would do a test on you, a genetic test, to see if you have something called high interleukin six, which means you're more predisposed to certain diseases and autoimmune conditions and things like that. If that was the case, I'd be like, "Hey, let's sit down. Let's reevaluate and see if this is the right fit for you." And you know, I see maybe ten to fifteen percent of the population that has that. Not everyone has a high interleukin six. And then if you didn't, then I would be very fine with putting implants in the body, and especially if they're done by really skilled people, because as surgeons, you can't just go to anybody and expect to get this done. When implants are done properly, they work really well. My mom has had one— has 2, actually— and it's been 20 years that she's had them. They're fine. She doesn't have any conditions. She's 75 years old, has no concerns whatsoever because they were done by a skilled surgeon and they were done properly. So usually when I'm prepping up somebody for implants, I usually like to make sure that their genetics are okay, number one. Number two, their bodies are not going to have any sort of problems. The reason I know that implants are okay is because scientifically we find people with titanium hips. And they're fine, right? And like I said, it has to be really good quality implants as well. Just like a lot of the stories we hear about implant failure and stuff like that, it's usually because there are implants that are not good quality. And then also the way they were placed was not proper. If you follow the correct protocol and if you're patient with it, it works really well. It's when people are trying to mess with the way that it's done that it leads to problems. If you make sure that there's no infection in the area, we place the implants, you wait 3 to 4 months, you put the crown on top. That's a custom fit crown made in that lab because we take an impression and we send it out. Um, normally I don't do that for my crowns, but only for my implant crowns. I always do an implant screw-retained crown. Um, I make sure we do implant procedures around it, so we're placing ozone around the implant every 3 months to maintain it. Um, there's no biofilm that develops or anything like that, and it's fine. It's like I said, everything is all about if things are not done right, then it leads to problems. And those are the horror stories we hear about. So it makes us all scared. But if you really follow the science, if we really do it right holistically, plan for it holistically, do it properly, it works really well. So I am fine with implants as long as they're done properly. And I'm going to go and chat a little bit more. I'm probably talking way too much here, but I want to give you as much information as I can. Yeah. So same thing with root canals. I hear patients all the time saying, oh, I don't want a root canal, I don't want a root canal. And you know what? Not all root canals are bad. We now have laser technology which gets rid of those red light bacteria, so we don't have to worry about all the horror stories we're hearing about. Our root canals are not done right, and they're not done with great technology. We now have technology using ozone, utilizing chloride ion. We have lasers that if a root canal needs to be done, we can disinfect it properly. And we now have cone beam technology. So with cone beam, we can even see the smallest little infection if it's there. So if we can do that and make sure that it's properly done, then we don't run into all the problems that they've been talking about for so many years. And that's why earlier we talked about holistic dentist versus a green dentist. The reason I call myself green is because I'm current with the data. Yeah. And because holistic at one point, it made sense, but now there's so much new technology and new innovations, and we're always looking at how to make our bodies safer, better. All the technology has evolved to make it work for us, and now we have that. And so we want to utilize it to make sure that it works really well for us.

That's brilliant. So somebody who's listening to this interview, they're like, oh my gosh, red light bacteria, oral microbiome, airway. It can be a little bit overwhelming on where to start. And so in addition to learning about you, we'll put your information in the show notes and they can learn more about what you have offerings. What are some things that people can start doing tangibly? Like today to start moving towards greater health in the mouth, et cetera?

I love it. This is my favorite question. So I always like to leave everyone with a morning and a nightly routine. So when it comes to your oral health, I want you to wake up first, brush your teeth, scrape your tongue, and get to work, whatever you need to do, right? In the evening, I want a nightly routine. Everyone always boasts about the morning routine, but with the teeth, I need a nightly routine.

Yes.

That means, number one, first you come home, shower, take all those germs off of you wherever you were, change into your clothes so you don't have any of those microbes on you. Secondly, I want to floss your teeth, brush your teeth, scrape your tongue. And then I like to use coconut oil on my gums. If you have 20 minutes and you want to detox, coconut oil pulling is fantastic. If you don't and you're in a rush, take some coconut oil or sesame oil, rub it on your gums, and then mouth tape. When you do that at night, it's going to be the best thing you do. And for better mental health and clarity, what I always say is do box breathing. So inhale for 4, hold for 4, exhale for 4, hold for 4. And if you're super stressed out, give your subconscious homework to do while you sleep. You can ask your subconscious, find me a solution for this. You do the box breathing, go to sleep, and I promise you, you wake up the next day, you'll be more refreshed. You're breathing through your nose, your body is super happy, and you would have found a solution to whatever the problem was. So it's working with your body and utilizing the resources It actually has because we are amazing beings. God, source, universe has created us to work, work really well. And let's use the resources we have. We're quantum beings. Let's use our resources to be able to live life in it. And we want you to live and live well.

Yeah. I have a, a potentially controversial question.

Okay. Okay.

So I feel like people fall on one side or the other with this question. And the question is about fluoride. And so a lot of people have been asking me, should I use fluoride or shouldn't? What about N-hydroxyapatite? What do you think about these?

Well, number one, I would say I would start with the hydroxy nanoapatite. That's number one. That's the first place I would start. The reason why hydroxy nanoapatite is a great alternative, because We're current with technology right now. We have a better method that we can use. So I would start with a hydroxy nanoapatite. My favorite toothpaste for hydroxy nanoapatite is Boka. B-O-K-A. It's fantastic. I love it. It is great. You can find it on Amazon. And then when it comes to fluoride, if you've got a thyroid condition, I do not recommend it. So that's when I would be really concerned about fluoride. But realistically, there are some patients who need it. And with those, I am very transparent. Just like if there's any sort of health concerns and they need medication, I'm going to be as natural as possible, but I'm also going to be realistic, right? And so I have certain patients with certain conditions where they have massive reflux, and it's a genetic— it's a defect of actually the valves, and it's not something that we can fix. And so for those patients, the only option I have is to use fluoride. So I put them on a fluoride toothpaste. We put them in a— we have them in a little tray that they can wear for about 5 minutes a day or 5 minutes at night before they go to sleep, and then they can swish out and then go to sleep. But I'm localizing it. I'm minimizing the amount that they're swallowing. So I'm taking those precautions into measure if they do need to use it. So, yeah, I'm being conscious, I guess, is the right way I would say it. I don't want to use it, but if I do need to use it, I am. And the way I'm going going to use it is going to be very controlled. So we're not swallowing it, we're not creating brittle bones, and we're not creating a lot of other concerns.

That's good nuance.

Yes, we're all about nuance around here. We love it. Also, I just want to give a quick plug for the— what is it called? Hydroxyapatite.

Hydroxy nanoapatite. You got to use nano. You can't use micro. Nano is the key because it's a smaller particle, because that's the only way it's going to get into Okay. The particle is too big.

I started using this toothpaste like 3 weeks ago, and my teeth are so much whiter. I've never had this ever with anything, and I'm so excited about it.

I love it. That's great.

It's a good testimony. What about oral probiotics? So people are worried about the red light bacteria. And so would oral probiotics be useful, or is it just a waste of your money?

So oral probiotics are good for patients with dry mouth. And dry mouth occurs especially if you're speaking all day, which we do, right? Oral probiotic is also good for patients sometimes if we're on anxiety medications or depressive medications, it causes dry mouth. Even high blood pressure medication causes dry mouth. So for those patients, it is fantastic. Women in their 40s sometimes get Sjögren's syndrome where salivary glands don't output as much. Much super important. People who may have sleep apnea or mouth breathing, really great. And then also my patients in their 60s, 70s, and 80s because the saliva is just not producing as much as it should. So it is actually really great. The key is going to be the oral probiotic has to be a lozenge. You got to suck on it. It's got to stay in your mouth because that's where it starts. That's how it's going to work really well. And one of my favorites that I really like is by Biogaia. Yeah. I really like that one because it's really great. It's super easy. It tastes like a breath mint, and it's almost like people are used to having mints around. So you can just have that, and it's a much better product, and it has good bacteria that actually is much better for you. So I prefer that very much, and I think it's actually useful. So the most important, flossing, brushing, scraping your tongue, and then add the oral probiotic. That's great. Ditch the mouthwash. You don't really need it. Add the probiotics in.

Oh my gosh, I feel like this is so good, Hadley. I feel like I kind of hijacked and asked so many questions, and I know we're coming to the end.

I feel like I've been asking so many questions.

Oh, good.

I'm just like, oh my gosh, I'm learning so much right now. I love this.

Yeah. So anything else that you want to make sure that people hear that maybe we didn't ask about or something that your clients commonly Well,

I would say dentistry has been a stepchild of medicine for such a long time. And I would just say your mouth is really important. It's one of the roots of the disease. And I specifically focus on how to prevent heart attack, diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer's, arthritis. And all of the things I look at, also the root is always one of the biggest reasons people don't heal is the mouth. So I always say, start with the mouth. I know dentistry can be uncomfortable sometimes, but find a provider you feel safe and comfortable with, build a relationship and get started. And really let me know if there's anything I can do to help. But really starting you guys on a journey. I want long live and live well.

Oh, that's amazing. And tell us how people can find you.

You can find me on drnammypatel.com. It's drnammypatel.com. My book is on there. You can also do courses. You can learn about the oral systemic connection and the red light bacteria. And there are also actually some exercises in there you can do, and you can start right away as well. You can also come to my office. I'm in San Francisco. We do telehealth. In fact, we have people from all over the world that come to see And that is going to be SF as in San Francisco, and then Green, G-R-E-E-N, dentist, D-E-N-T-I-S-T.com. And if you want your dentist to learn about what we do, I'm teaching other dentists to do what I do because then we have a bigger impact in the world. So reach out and I'll do whatever I can to serve you.

Oh my goodness, you're such a gift. Thank you for the work that you do. It's so important. I feel inspired that maybe one day I could get off of the Afrin.

Absolutely. Absolutely. I feel like I've come on over. I mean, I can guarantee it. I can guarantee I'll get you off the Afrin. Absolutely. And yeah, I can guarantee it for sure.

So I don't need to go like Roto-Rooter my nose?

No, the Roto-Rootering is— in fact, it's funny that you say that. My dad just had to have it done, but then he's 79 years old and he had fungus and stuff like that. And I wish knew about all this stuff 20 years ago. And it's in the last 10 years where all the science and things like that are developing. But you don't need to have it rotter-rotter, especially if we can get it sooner,

right?

At 79, it's a little bit of a challenge. You're way younger than that. So I'm not sure how old you are, but you're way younger than that. And we can definitely get it sooner and it doesn't develop into something like that.

All right, Hads, we're going to go to San Fran.

I know. I'm excited. We're going to have to take a trip. Yay.

Awesome.

I'm looking forward.

Thank you so much for being here. This has been a wonderful conversation. We'll for sure include everything in the show notes. And everyone, thanks for listening and follow the tips, those tangible tips, starting with right now. Scrape, floss, brush, and then maybe a little bit of coconut.

Okay.

Tape your mouth shut and let's do this. All right, thanks everyone.

Thanks all. Bye.