Natural Ways to Whiten Your Teeth at Home

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Overview

Healthy milky white teeth are important assets for anybody. This is also a great confidence booster and a person with good teeth easily feels public acceptance. White teeth also tend to highlight your face when you smile. This when coupled with your talk and your attitude creates a double positive impact of your presence.

Every person in his life would have at least stood once in front of the mirror gazing at the colour of his teeth. Many a time people might have noticed them being yellow in colour which usually brings a deep sense of distress. Many thoughts like ‘I can’t face my boss…or I may not be able to face the public….or I have lost my dignity….or is it a serious medical condition I’ve had landed into…?’ pop up and stagnates the mind which brings a negative impact in their life. .

Ayurveda, the science of life, provides many remedies to get healthy white teeth and to clear off this problem. Some of these remedies give you immediate relief but some are preventive factors that are to be practiced daily for preventing yellow discoloration. .

Natural Ways to Whiten Your Teeth at Home

NORMAL COLOR OF TEETH:

  • Generally, teeth are light yellow to greyish or bluish-white in colour. Since enamel is semi translucent, the colour of dentin and structures underneath enamel strongly affect the appearance of a tooth.
  • There are usually two types of dentition. The first dentition that appears by around the age of 6 – 8 months is called as primary dentition or milk teeth. All these teeth are gradually lost and replaced by permanent teeth which start appearing around 6-7 years of age. .
  • The enamel on primary teeth has a more density of opaque crystalline minerals. This makes it appear to be whiter. In permanent teeth the density of these crystalline minerals is less and hence, it appears dull when compared to the milk teeth. .

What causes yellowing of teeth?

A yellow tooth is not a very serious medical condition. The common causes are:

Lack of Oral Hygiene

  • Improper routine for brushing of teeth, flossing and rinsing your mouth cause accumulation of plaque and tartars thus making them yellow.

Getting Old

  • Thick enamel looks white, but thin enamel allows dentin tones to show through, making teeth look yellow from the outside. As a person gets old his enamel gets thin making its appearance yellow. .

Lack of Fluorine content of water

  • High levels of fluoride in water cause yellow blotching of teeth. .

Smoking

  • Tobacco products in various forms like cigarettes, pipe smoke can stain teeth due to an accumulation of tannins.

Dry Mouth

  • Saliva neutralizes the acid and washes it away. But those who have dry mouth miss out this protective effect. People who breathe through their mouth, because of blocked nasal passages or other medical causes or even as a habit, have dry mouth. This decreases saliva and hence doesn’t neutralize the acidic pH in the mouth completely which puts them at risk of developing thin tooth enamel, thus makes it to look yellow.

Constant intake of sour foods and drinks:

  • Sour foods, like sour candies, oranges, soda etc, decrease the pH of mouth thereby increasing demineralization. This makes enamel thin and makes teeth appear yellow.

Medicines

  • Some antibiotics, antihistamines, drugs for high blood pressure and antipsychotic medications can cause yellow blotching of teeth of children younger than 8 years old.

Diseases

  • Sometimes even chronic diseases can affect enamel and lead to yellow discoloration of teeth. Even chemotherapy or radiation therapy may discolour the teeth. In these cases, the discoloration is more of a brownish colour.

Hereditary

  • Yellow teeth can even be as a result of inheritance.

Simple Home Remedies to Whiten Your Teeth at Home

Remedies that may help in getting rid of yellow teeth. There is an alternative way that helps in tooth whitening.

Home Remedies for Yellow Teeth

1. Baking soda and hydrogen peroxide:

  • Using baking soda and hydrogen peroxide may help reduce the yellowing of the teeth.

How to Use

  • 1 tablespoon of baking soda with 2 tablespoons of hydrogen peroxide. Mix together and make a paste. It will help in tooth whitening.

2. Vitamin C:

  • A 2007 study found that vitamin C deficiency may worsen periodontitis, which is a build-up of bacteria on the teeth and gums. This build-up contributes to discoloration.
  • Thus, Vitamin C may reduce discoloration of the teeth.

3. Rinse with natural oils:

  • Add this easy step to your morning routine to achieve a whiter smile without damaging your teeth. “Coconut oil, sage oil, and lemon peel oil are the best natural ingredients to use to whiten teeth without damaging enamel or causing sensitivity.

4. Use of Lemon and salt:

  • This combination is widely practiced to remove the yellowish discoloration of teeth. Both these are scarifying agents. But many have reported of getting sensitive teeth on applying it. This is because of the acidic pH of the lemon. Secondly practicing this for a long time may fasten the degradation of enamel, thereby making it more yellow.

What are the Ayurvedic methods to remove the yellow colour?

1. Brushing your teeth with herbal powders (Danta Dhavana)

Ayurveda advises using Herbs which are Kashaya (astringent), Katu (pungent) or Tikta (bitter) rasa (taste) in nature. Herbs with these rasa have the ability to scrap plaques (doshas) from the teeth. They are anti-microbial in nature and hence prevent the accumulation of bacterial colonies in the teeth. These herbs will even remove the yellowish discoloration of teeth and make them appear glistering white.

Herbs which are specifically used are

  1. Arka
  2. Nyagrodha
  3. Arjuna,
  4. Khadira
  5. Karanja.

ARKA

  • The skin on the root helps in removing bacteria and cleans the plaque.

NYAGRODHA

  • It restores colour of the teeth.

ARJUNA

  • It helps in repairing the damaged tissues.

KHADIRA

  • This herb is specifically beneficial for teeth (dantya) and has anti-microbial activities (krimighna)

Out of all these herbs, Khadira is the most specific. It is dantya, i.e., it is beneficial for the teeth. Usually, in villages where there is plenty of vegetation, fresh herbs are taken and the part is bitten and chewed to make it in the form of a brush and then teeth are cleaned. When fresh herbs are unavailable, dry powders (choorna) of these plants can be taken and used for brushing.

Apart from these, the following herbs are also helpful in whitening the teeth

1. GHRIHADHOOMA

  • It is the kitchen soot. It is found in abundance when firewood is burnt in a kitchen for cooking.

2. YAVAKSHARA

  • It is the alkali preparation from yava (barley). This helps in removing the plaques from teeth, thereby making it white.

3. LOHA BHASMA

  • It is made fromiron which has a scarifying action.

4. TRIKATU

  • Trikatu is a combination of Shunti (Ginger), Pippali (Long Pepper), Kali Mirch (Black Pepper)

5. HONEY

  • It is has a scarifying (vilekhana) action. It is heals the wound (vrana) and cleanses it. It has the capacity to enter even into the minute (sookshma) pores in the body and helps in clearing the pathways. It helps to maintain the color or complexion (varnyam)

2.Oil Pulling with Sesame Oil (Tila TailaGandoosha)

  • In Ayurveda, sesame oil has been described to bring wonderful effects on teeth. It helps in bringing stability (sthairyata) and strength (bala) of the enamel.It also helps in bringing back the colour (varnyakaram) of the teeth. It easily enters the smallest (sooksham) channels in the body. It helps in nourishing the teeth (brihana). It is scarifying (lekhana) in nature. Oil pulling (Gandoosha) is a procedure in which oil is put in mouth and kept for nearly half an hour.

How to Use

  • This can be done after brushing teeth with above-said powders. This oil pulling helps in the removal of excess dosha from the teeth. When constantly practiced, it improves the remineralisation of enamel and helps in attaining its strength, resistance against traumas, improvement in thickness thereby helps in attaining a white tooth.

3. Practice Pan Chewing (Tamboola Sevana)

  • This may seem erroneous, but it is highly scientific and was practiced in olden days. Chewing two betel leaves, 1 areca nut and little quantity of slaked lime added with herbal powders of Karpoora, Jatiphala and Lavangais extremely helpful in removing the plaque deposits in teeth, increasing the salivation and increasing the pH of mouth which decreases immediately after intake of food. This increase of pH will help in the remineralisation of enamel. The action of these herbal drugs prevent the formation of bio-film over the teeth and thereby preventing plaque formation.

KARPOORA

  • It acts as lekhana as it removes the plaque and bad breath from the mouth

LAVANGA

  • It reduces the accumulation of saliva, bad smell from the mouth (vaktrakledadaurgandhyanashanam)

JATIPHALA

  • This drug has a specific action of removing the plaques in the mouth thereby removing the bad breath (mukhadaurgandhya) and discoloration (krishnata)