I can't wait for daily teeth brushing to be a thing of the past. It amazes me we've had so many technological advances while still having such primitive mouth cleaning solutions.
There's people that basically never have to brush their teeth, why can't their magical bacteria be used by everyone? I recently asked a dentist in training and they told me the bacteria would die after eating the plaque. Even if you have to regularly re-add the bacteria, it doesn't seem like that big of a deal. You could make a lozenge which you suck on once a week, and it's still less effort than brushing daily.
Are you trying to make a point that it's unrealistic? Because there's definitely people that don't have to brush their teeth daily to maintain great dental health. Calling it magical bacteria is a bit of a hyperbole, but I figured anyone reading my post in good faith would catch that.
I've never looked into the facts, but anecdotally I've known of two close friends who never (and I mean never - not an observation, but an admission) brushed their teeth and never had one solitary cavity. They ate pretty normal American diets (meat, sugar, carbs, soda, coffee, but nothing in excess). Additionally, I've heard this same second-hand anecdote from others multiple times in my life.
Do you really have to do it daily with them? I have two zirconium-based implanted teeth and they're always smooth. Zero biological film or gunk on them, and I had some periods this year during which I didn't brush teeth for 4-5 days. All other teeth were nasty but the zirconium implants looked and felt pristine. (Sadly still prone to food bits getting stuck in-between though, but oral shower and interdental brushes take care of that.)
Though I agree that even if you replace all your teeth you still have to brush somewhat because the gums need the cleanup as well and you can't replace those. Though I'd think I can get away with a much shorter procedure than what I do for several years now (powerful oral shower, interdental brushes, brushing teeth and gums, and Listerine).
That's what I thought, thanks. Interdental brushing is the one and only unavoidable cleaning procedure even if all your teeth are artificial, it seems.
Gums and inter-teeth space are still prone to pollution that can easily grow to infections and ultimately nasty stuff like periodontitis (I got operated to be cured of it several years ago).
I can attest that this is not a rule. Some people simply do not develop bad breath despite never brushing (I am not one of them). I assume it is a lucky minority.
I would still brush my teeth after every meal if I can. Not only to prevent smells. I find it also reduces the frequency of snacking and thus helps to keep the weight down.
There was a version of streptococcus mutans developed that didn’t produce tons of lactic acid and would have pretty much ended tooth decay back in 2000. Iirc, it was built to outcompete the regular bacteria too. As far as I can tell there’s been no progress in commercializing this-—I assume because of the cost and complexity of FDA approval.
I wonder if there is anything more to the reason that it has never gained any real traction? A lot of groups would stand to lose a lot of money if something like this become used by even half the population. This would mean a massive reduction in purchases of many dental products, visits to dentists, procedures needed by dentists, etc.
You're trying to make a joke here, but please do some reasearch about the dental lobbying groups. The ADA is no joke.
What OP is implying is not really tinfoil hat material. As one example, one of the reasons parroted (by democrats, actually) that we won't have universal healthcare ever, is that it's going to cause thousands of health insurance jobs to dissapear.
Then why doesn't a country with a nationalized health care system do it? There are incentives in other countries that would encourage this, if it were possible.
I'm not saying there isn't such a country, but the countries with national health care that I know about don't or don't fully cover dental health (presumably because one can live in perfect health with a rotting mouth and not due to a strong dental healthcare lobby /s).
How oh how did our ancestors survive without the dental lobby!? How did the children with their rotten ass teeth consume all their goodies and sodie pops with such poorly functioning teeth!? Its a complete mystery, one I'm sure is lost to the sands of the 1950s.
> ...there was never yet philosopher that could endure the toothache patiently (shakespeare)
Why defer to a baseless "probably" when you can easily check what is known about the past? Wikipedia doesn't put the blame on refined sugar but rather point to farming as to what correlated with dental issues. Are you familiar with the barber's pole? that's the sign for the location where our ancestors went to be relived from owning teeth.
My nationalized healthcare comment is unlreated to the existence of the dental industry in its current form. It was just an example to point out that protecting jobs is something our elected leaders are worried about when lobbyists are paying up (they're not really that worried about jobs dissapearing due to automation or mergers or monolopies, etc..)
Regardless of the type of healthcare (nationalized, private, etc..) the dental health industry is still getting paid, the only diffference is who is doing it. The original statement was that a breakthrough in preventive medicine will destroy a large portion of the bread and butter of the dental health industry, which will lead to it being only a fraction of what it is today. Industries fight tooth and nail to keep growing. Guess what they do when their existence is threatened.
> Regardless of the type of healthcare (nationalized, private, etc..) the dental health industry is still getting paid, the only diffference is who is doing it.
No, one difference is who is doing it, another one is the sums being payed. That's why the dental industry in countries with national health care fight to stay out of the general health system. The lucrative compensation of the practitioners lead people to want to go specifically for that. If it were part of national health care it would cease to be sure path to accumulating loads of money, the incentive to become a dentist as well as the power of current practitioner will be similar to that of family doctors or orthopedic specialist. Spoiler alert: in countries with national health care their status is higher then the status of teachers in national school systems, but not by much.
I appreciate your response. I almost didn't even make the original comment because I knew I would get 'conspiracy nut' responses, as I did lol I promise, I'm the furthest from a conspiracy nut.
What's more likely, vast cabal conspiring against competing product, or competing product just doesn't work as well as claimed? There aren't nearly as many grand conspiracies out there as there should be.
You think that the governments of the world with much poorer people wouldn't jump on something like this? Improving dental health dramatically improves outcomes all across the board.
If something works, someone, somewhere in the world would start using it. Hell, people are willing to use stuff that is flat out harmful simply because some people on the internet said so.
The big issue with bio things is that the human organism has a lot of variation and a lot of cures sorta work for some people some of the time. Consequently, a high enough bar to get FDA clearance has to be significantly strong.
(Two good recent examples: A woman died from oxalate overload from drinking green smoothies and Vitamin C and anti-oxidants can spur cancer growth. Does that mean that everybody should stop drinking green smoothies and taking Vitamin C? Obviously no. But it shows that humans vary and that things aren't always straightforward.)
No way?! Great find, dude. I wonder if anyone can comment about it specifically or if it might be worthwhile to start a thread soliciting users experience...
I've never tried it but I see cause for skepticism: the claim is that these beneficial bacteria will out-compete the harmful ones. But if that's true, why would it take 30 days for them to get established? One shot of Listerine to kill what's there now, then one batch of the good critters to get them started, and, if the claims are true, you should be set for life, right? So something doesn't add up.
Doesn't your body have a reservoir of your microbiome throughout your body (like in the appendix or whatever)? Is it that far-out that some of the mouth stuff makes it there as well? Keep in mind, these bacteria have probably adapted and co-evolved over our development as a species, they must be fairly hardy and well-positioned
Not qualified to argue with your very logical position here but I feel like it might be a longer-term transition and there might still be hold-outs if its only a one-and-done deal like you've described.
It totally makes sense as a real-life conspiracy theory too, although I'm not super familiar with the ADA's exploits. Obviously, dentists have an enormous amount to lose if something like this ever escaped the laboratory, so to speak.
That's true, but if it really were the case that you could stop cavities and gum disease by popping a pill that was already on the market I don't see any way they could stop it. I also think that there are a few ADA members who actually care about people's dental health, and if they thought that there was a conspiracy to suppress such a thing, they would have said so.
Like I said, nothing would make me happier than to be proven wrong about this. But right now my money is on the things-that-sound-too-good-to-be-true-usually-are theory.
It could be the case that these specific strain of good bacteria does not last long enough in the mouth for some reason. For example they could mutate or they might not have the capability to attach itself to the tooth surface for long enough.
In their website they claim that within 30 days the good bacteria will outcompetes the bad one. I don't think you can stop taking the tablets after those 30 days completely to keep tits benefits. Those bacteria might die down over a course of a few months for various reasons.
What do you think "outcompete" means in the context of evolutionary biology? Something is going to set up shop in your mouth; it's just too attractive an environment to be left fallow. Whatever that ends up being without intervention has by definition outcompeted all the other contenders. So if the good bacteria don't persist, then by definition they have not "outcompeted" the competition.
Guess the main point is the environment itself changes depending on what you do and what you eat. So you need to constantly resupply the initial good bacteria for them to keep holding on
Is there any reason you can't just propogate and cultivate them in a seperate breeding receptacle for an unlimited supply like people do with SCOBY or whatever for making sourdough and kombucha?
Is there any reason you can't just propogate and cultivate them in a seperate breeding receptacle for an unlimited supply like people do with SCOBY or whatever for making sourdough?
Zinc starves bacteria via a variety of means, and a high zinc intake will see high levels of zinc in the saliva and in the teeth, helping to keep bacterial levels down, but RDA's are highly conservative amounts for young healthy people, not old or ill people, which then makes some RDA's woefully inadequate.
Very few products kill 100% of bacteria, even deionised water will still have less than 25 colony forming bacteria per litre in it, although by virtue of being deionised has less in it to help bacteria get established.
Acidifying water will make it harder for pseudomonas to get established.
But when scientists say they are searching for life on mars or an asteroid, they are referring to bacteria, mainly the bacillus aka rod shaped bacteria as it can survive in radiation 100,000 times more than humans can survive in, and extreme cold like space, so global warming and melting ice at the poles presents new viral and bacterial risks.
Diet can also reduce the body's own immune response, for example calcium disodium ethylene diamine tetra-acetate aka Calcium disodium EDTA found in a variety of products from makeup to food like Mayonnaise chelates zinc reducing zinc's ability to activate GPR39.
Zinc's inability from deficiency or chemicals like the one mentioned above, from being able to activate GPR39, creates a myriad of problems in human health, including reducing saliva production. [1]
There isnt anything wrong with using bacteria to out compete other bacteria, but adaptions occur.
Phages are viruses that kill bacteria, something the Russians developed decades ago as the West when with antibiotics[2]. I would also consider Georgia as a medical destination for some conditions as they are superior to Western options. Some of their doctors do scoff at the Western doctors!
You can find millions if not billions of phages in just 1ml of seawater [3]. The problem with phages is they take time to develop, so you could be dead before the bacterial strain is identified and a phage is developed, so antibiotics are the fastest immediate response, but the gold standard is antibiotics until the phages have been developed and then used as a part of a treatment program, but you'll only get this from very expensive private healthcare.
Of course drinking seawater when one goes surfing is a bit of pot luck, or lucky dip with regards to consuming phages. It makes me wonder if Surfers Against Sewage know about phages. [4]
So lots of different ways to tackle health problems, but medical experts cant always use them due to cost or simply lack of knowledge.
I've always had this idea for something you could put on your teeth before you start eating like those trays people use for whitening but obviously more robust. I wonder why nobody has ever pursued this angle, stop the food from ever touching your teeth in the first place. I'm sure someone will be able to shoot this down in 3 seconds but I fail to see why one couldn't simply create a flexible barrier to prevent all these problems. Sort of like a dental dam for eating
My naïve thought, assuming it was effective, could outcompete acid spewing species, and you had dosed a handful of the population: why would it not have been able to spread through the population?
Inoculated person X kisses two people, they go on to kiss two people, etc. Probably too simple a model, but I assume that kissing spreads all manner of microorganisms. How much do you need for the bacteria to take hold?
> Diindolylmethane might act like estrogen in the body, but might also block estrogen effects.
Right, so don't swallow it?
> People commonly use diindolylmethane for breast cancer, prostate cancer, and many other conditions, but there is no good scientific evidence to support these uses.
This molecule is safe to eat, it helps the body fight the stomach ulcer bacteria. This cuts the slime that these bacteria use but aren't indiscriminate at killing microbes. You're immune system still does the actual work this just prevents evasive measures resistant bugs use.
I take it in capsule form. It may be worth noting should anyone decide to take this to remember in advance how it will color the urine. The first time can be rather disturbing. It makes the urine kindof a splotchy red/bronze color if it has not been consumed in a while. I totally forgot about that the first time and though I was experiencing renal failure at first.
I personally only take small amounts as it seems to up-regulate some repair pathways that can cause pain in some joints. No pain no gain but I'm just lazy enough to stick with broccoli sprouts for DIM and sulforaphane most of the time. I also don't measure serum estrogen and guess as with most things.
Careful, if this molecule is basically an antibiotic (and at that, with poor effectiveness outside of a specific dose range), you could produce resistant bacteria or hard-to-predict side effects
there is something odd about their results. the compound was found not to be effective at either 0.1x or 10x of the effective dose. and they don't really explain why. this kind of dose-response curve makes it impractical to use.
Wow, you're right; the results are very strange. Concentrations of 50, 5, and .05 have no effect at all, while .5 almost completely eliminated biofilm. That kind of looks like experimental error.
Wowwwww. I desperately want this approach to hold up but who in their right mind puts that in a paper with only the caveat “interestingly, only one dose worked.” when they tested three others with literally zero effect and there’s no known mechanistic reason listed.
I hope I’m missing something but that looks like a ridiculous blunder perhaps made to get forward to publishing.
Whatever dental society that is gets paid for giving dentists licences is not gonna approve this if it means it will lower cavities by a lot, a big portion of dentists fees is from patching up cavities and it’s sideffects.
I feel like I've read some variation of "new thing will make tooth brushing obsolete" every few years for the last two decades at least, but they never seem to come to fruition.
> A significant portion of the global population experiences persistent issues with dental plaque and cavities or will face them at some time.
How significant a percentage are we talking about?
Pretty much every dentist I've seen throughout my life has told me that I'm somehow immune to cavities. I don't know how they're figuring this out just from looking in my mouth (I'm not aware of having had any saliva tests or anything like that), but they've all agreed about it.
I wonder if I'm in some less significant percentage of people who foster this bacteria (or something like it) on our own somehow?
I've only ever been a once-a-day brusher and "only if something is stuck" flosser, to no ill effects so far. That's as far as I'm willing to push it though.
This molecule, DIM, supposedly breaks up the biofilms of S. mutans. But there are other substances known to break up biofilms, including xylitol. There's been research around this, and it suggests that it can work but only under the condition that sucrose (and possibly other sugars) not be present.
Really only needs to be done once daily. Twice daily is recommended because people tend to not brush their teeth properly and miss things. Doing it twice tends to hit the areas missed in the first pass.
I'd like to see more research on bleach (sodium hypochlorite) for this purpose. The limited studies out there are very promising for bleach as a mouthwash, where it compares favorably to chlorhexidine, another bacteria killer available as prescription mouthwash. Unlike chlorhexidine, however, it doesn't stain teeth as significantly, and it's obviously much cheaper. (Note: the concentration is 0.1% typically, so diluted from the 6% common in the jug)
One interesting point I saw was that bleach is unlikely to promote oral cancers, unlike alcohol mouthwash or oxygenating compounds like hydrogen peroxide.
When I read this, I ordered powdered DIM, and xylitol to make my own mouthwash. But there was an old study about stevia extract, which was also found to be extremely effective against biofilms, so, maybe I may add add more to the cocktail. Best would be to chew also mastic cum before swashing as that was found also highly effective against cavity-causing bacteria.
I've always had this idea for something you could put on your teeth before you start eating like those trays people use for whitening but obviously more robust. I wonder why nobody has ever pursued this angle, stop the food from ever touching your teeth in the first place. I'm sure someone will be able to shoot this down in 3 seconds but I fail to see why one couldn't simply create a flexible barrier to prevent all these problems. Sort of like a dental dam for eating
100 comments
[ 4.2 ms ] story [ 223 ms ] threadThere's people that basically never have to brush their teeth, why can't their magical bacteria be used by everyone? I recently asked a dentist in training and they told me the bacteria would die after eating the plaque. Even if you have to regularly re-add the bacteria, it doesn't seem like that big of a deal. You could make a lozenge which you suck on once a week, and it's still less effort than brushing daily.
Though I agree that even if you replace all your teeth you still have to brush somewhat because the gums need the cleanup as well and you can't replace those. Though I'd think I can get away with a much shorter procedure than what I do for several years now (powerful oral shower, interdental brushes, brushing teeth and gums, and Listerine).
Gums and inter-teeth space are still prone to pollution that can easily grow to infections and ultimately nasty stuff like periodontitis (I got operated to be cured of it several years ago).
E.g., https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12369203/
What OP is implying is not really tinfoil hat material. As one example, one of the reasons parroted (by democrats, actually) that we won't have universal healthcare ever, is that it's going to cause thousands of health insurance jobs to dissapear.
Why defer to a baseless "probably" when you can easily check what is known about the past? Wikipedia doesn't put the blame on refined sugar but rather point to farming as to what correlated with dental issues. Are you familiar with the barber's pole? that's the sign for the location where our ancestors went to be relived from owning teeth.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barber%27s_pole
Regardless of the type of healthcare (nationalized, private, etc..) the dental health industry is still getting paid, the only diffference is who is doing it. The original statement was that a breakthrough in preventive medicine will destroy a large portion of the bread and butter of the dental health industry, which will lead to it being only a fraction of what it is today. Industries fight tooth and nail to keep growing. Guess what they do when their existence is threatened.
No, one difference is who is doing it, another one is the sums being payed. That's why the dental industry in countries with national health care fight to stay out of the general health system. The lucrative compensation of the practitioners lead people to want to go specifically for that. If it were part of national health care it would cease to be sure path to accumulating loads of money, the incentive to become a dentist as well as the power of current practitioner will be similar to that of family doctors or orthopedic specialist. Spoiler alert: in countries with national health care their status is higher then the status of teachers in national school systems, but not by much.
If something works, someone, somewhere in the world would start using it. Hell, people are willing to use stuff that is flat out harmful simply because some people on the internet said so.
The big issue with bio things is that the human organism has a lot of variation and a lot of cures sorta work for some people some of the time. Consequently, a high enough bar to get FDA clearance has to be significantly strong.
(Two good recent examples: A woman died from oxalate overload from drinking green smoothies and Vitamin C and anti-oxidants can spur cancer growth. Does that mean that everybody should stop drinking green smoothies and taking Vitamin C? Obviously no. But it shows that humans vary and that things aren't always straightforward.)
What if it invades the gut?
[0]: https://www.dentistryiq.com/dentistry/oral-systemic-health/a...
[1]: https://probiorahealth.com/
Not qualified to argue with your very logical position here but I feel like it might be a longer-term transition and there might still be hold-outs if its only a one-and-done deal like you've described.
Mea culpa tho, I definitely want to believe
Me too. Nothing would make me happier than for someone to show me why I'm wrong here.
Like I said, nothing would make me happier than to be proven wrong about this. But right now my money is on the things-that-sound-too-good-to-be-true-usually-are theory.
In their website they claim that within 30 days the good bacteria will outcompetes the bad one. I don't think you can stop taking the tablets after those 30 days completely to keep tits benefits. Those bacteria might die down over a course of a few months for various reasons.
Then unless your mouth ends up bacteria-free, the good bacteria are by definition not out-competing the bad ones.
Very few products kill 100% of bacteria, even deionised water will still have less than 25 colony forming bacteria per litre in it, although by virtue of being deionised has less in it to help bacteria get established. Acidifying water will make it harder for pseudomonas to get established. But when scientists say they are searching for life on mars or an asteroid, they are referring to bacteria, mainly the bacillus aka rod shaped bacteria as it can survive in radiation 100,000 times more than humans can survive in, and extreme cold like space, so global warming and melting ice at the poles presents new viral and bacterial risks.
Diet can also reduce the body's own immune response, for example calcium disodium ethylene diamine tetra-acetate aka Calcium disodium EDTA found in a variety of products from makeup to food like Mayonnaise chelates zinc reducing zinc's ability to activate GPR39.
Zinc's inability from deficiency or chemicals like the one mentioned above, from being able to activate GPR39, creates a myriad of problems in human health, including reducing saliva production. [1]
There isnt anything wrong with using bacteria to out compete other bacteria, but adaptions occur.
Phages are viruses that kill bacteria, something the Russians developed decades ago as the West when with antibiotics[2]. I would also consider Georgia as a medical destination for some conditions as they are superior to Western options. Some of their doctors do scoff at the Western doctors!
You can find millions if not billions of phages in just 1ml of seawater [3]. The problem with phages is they take time to develop, so you could be dead before the bacterial strain is identified and a phage is developed, so antibiotics are the fastest immediate response, but the gold standard is antibiotics until the phages have been developed and then used as a part of a treatment program, but you'll only get this from very expensive private healthcare.
Of course drinking seawater when one goes surfing is a bit of pot luck, or lucky dip with regards to consuming phages. It makes me wonder if Surfers Against Sewage know about phages. [4]
So lots of different ways to tackle health problems, but medical experts cant always use them due to cost or simply lack of knowledge.
[1] https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/22/8/3872
[2] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6203130/
[3] https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210115-the-viruses-that....
[4] https://www.sas.org.uk/
https://www.lifeextension.com/vitamins-supplements/item02120...
Last scan by the wayback machine.
https://web.archive.org/web/20230628125533/https://probiorah...
Inoculated person X kisses two people, they go on to kiss two people, etc. Probably too simple a model, but I assume that kissing spreads all manner of microorganisms. How much do you need for the bacteria to take hold?
https://www.webmd.com/vitamins/ai/ingredientmono-1049/diindo...
> Diindolylmethane might act like estrogen in the body, but might also block estrogen effects.
Right, so don't swallow it?
> People commonly use diindolylmethane for breast cancer, prostate cancer, and many other conditions, but there is no good scientific evidence to support these uses.
Or perhaps do swallow it?
I personally only take small amounts as it seems to up-regulate some repair pathways that can cause pain in some joints. No pain no gain but I'm just lazy enough to stick with broccoli sprouts for DIM and sulforaphane most of the time. I also don't measure serum estrogen and guess as with most things.
Figure 1 at https://www.mdpi.com/2079-6382/12/6/1017
I hope I’m missing something but that looks like a ridiculous blunder perhaps made to get forward to publishing.
Like soft drinks, it's pretty much water + additives.
Yet it makes brand name soft drinks look extremely cheap. ;)
Most effective are those Oral B electric brushes that alternately rotate back and forth.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ardp.202200493
How significant a percentage are we talking about?
Pretty much every dentist I've seen throughout my life has told me that I'm somehow immune to cavities. I don't know how they're figuring this out just from looking in my mouth (I'm not aware of having had any saliva tests or anything like that), but they've all agreed about it.
I wonder if I'm in some less significant percentage of people who foster this bacteria (or something like it) on our own somehow?
My dentist told me there's two types of mouth flora: one that causes cavities, and one that causes calculus. My mouth seems to be of the latter.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32932149/
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342535934_Xylitol_a...
One interesting point I saw was that bleach is unlikely to promote oral cancers, unlike alcohol mouthwash or oxygenating compounds like hydrogen peroxide.
Staining w/chlorhexidine appears to be very individual.