Fix Your Mouth to Fix Your Body: Oral Health Hacks (Tongue Exercises & Scraping, Oil Pulling, Mouth Taping, & Breathwork)

Nick Urban [00:00:07]:
Are you a high performer, obsessed with growth, and looking for an edge? Welcome to MINDBODY Peak Performance. Together, we’ll discover underground secrets to unlocking the full potential of your mind, body, and spirit. We’ll learn from some of the world’s leading minds, from ancient wisdom to cutting edge tools and everything in between. This is your host, Nick Urban. Enjoy the episode. Are flossing and brushing your teeth enough to maintain perfect oral health? Aside from aesthetic purposes, is there even a reason to focus on your oral health? Joining us in this episode is doctor Nami Patel. Here, she’s exposing the forgotten link between the state of your mouth and overall wellness. Together, we explore how things like mouth breathing, chlorine in your water, and even the position of your tongue impacts everything from digestion to cognitive function to athletic performance and beyond.

Nick Urban [00:01:15]:
If you have any nagging health issues, this is one episode that you will not wanna miss. In fact, this topic is so important that a while back, I wrote an article called The Hidden Forgotten on the overlooked root causes of disease and condition. If you wanna check that out, you can to check out that article, go ahead and look in the show notes and click that link, or you can Google outlier.com disease root causes. In this one, we also break down how skilled practitioners can use the mouth as a barometer of your overall health. That’s right. Some people can actually diagnose your health status solely based on your mouth. We also talk about the impact saliva plays on your overall health and your oral microbiome, not just your saliva and your microbiome, but also the position of your tongue and your breathing patterns, oil pulling, sleep apnea, the role of low grade infections, the link between ADHD, acid reflux, and oral health, as well as the future of oral health, what you can do to optimize this neglected facet of systemic health. Our guest this week is doctor Nami Patel.

Nick Urban [00:02:35]:
She’s a holistic dentist dedicated to patient health and environmentally conscious dentistry. She founded Green Dentistry in 02/2005 where they not only use energy efficient systems, but also safe materials. Doctor Nami is also the author of Age with Style and is developing a nonprofit to promote greener dentistry in India. This is episode 200 of the podcast, and you can find the show notes for everything we discuss at mindbodypeak.com slash the number 200. If you’d like to work with her, you can visit doctor, spelled all the way out, nami, n a m m y, patel, p a t e l, Com. 1 last thing before we get started. What are you up to on Saturday, April 12 and Sunday, April 13? If you don’t have plans yet, I’d love for you to join me at the Health Optimization Summit here in Austin, Texas. It’s going to be one of the greatest health and wellness and biohacking and longevity events of the year.

Nick Urban [00:03:37]:
There will be 35 world leading speakers, over a hundred cutting edge brands, and 2,000 people in attendance getting the inside scoop on all of this. To join us, go to healthoptimization,withans,notaz,.com, and use the code Nick to save 10%. Again, that’s healthoptimization.com, and the code Nick will save you 10%. See you there. Alright. On to this week’s episode with doctor Patel. Doctor Nami, welcome to the podcast.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:04:11]:
Thank you for having me, Nick. I’m so excited.

Nick Urban [00:04:14]:
I am too. Because today, we’re gonna be connecting the dots about how your mouth relates to overall health, wellness, and even performance. So before we dive in today, what are the unusual nonnegotiables you’ve done so far today for your health, your performance, and your bio harmony?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:04:33]:
Oh, I love that. That’s a great question. The most important for me is going to be I intermittent fast. So the most important today is a non eating day. So I actually do a thirty six hour fast, not a sixteen or an eight. So today is a non eating day, so I’m really excited and love it. I can have mental clarity. I’m excited.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:04:53]:
I’m excited to speak to you as you as you can, hear from my voice here. So that’s the first thing. A second thing is my hydration, making sure I am making sure I’m hydrated. I actually do, 16 ounces of water as soon as I wake up. And I actually use a wonderful, was it’s actually a cellular, biochemical. It’s with the name of the company is called ASEA, a s e a a. And the beauty of it, it actually helps all your cells to communicate better. So that’s the first thing I start with in the morning, doing a thirty six hour fast.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:05:29]:
So that’s super exciting. And then of course, taking my supplements.

Nick Urban [00:05:32]:
What is ASEA? Is that a powder? What’s the active ingredient?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:05:36]:
It’s actually chloride. It’s a chlorine. So basically it actually funny, it tastes like bleach almost, but it actually is a wonderful mechanism. What it’s actually designed to do is that it actually helps reduce oxidative stress. It actually helps, get the free radicals that are inside the body and they’re removed so that your cells can function better. And, it’s a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful product, to start off with and really helps our bodies on a daily basis maintain, overall peak performance.

Nick Urban [00:06:10]:
Mhmm. And you said it’s oh, is that CDS? Chlorine chlorine’s diodoxysulfide or something like that?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:06:19]:
It’s something like that, but I don’t think it’s CDS. It’s it’s chlorine something. But I I do use it’s funny because we use that in dentistry. We use, we have a mouthwash called Oricare, and it actually creates a chlorine dioxide gas, which actually kills off for the, like, a lot of bad bacteria in the mouth. So this was a little bit different, but same concept. So it works really well.

Nick Urban [00:06:41]:
Yeah. I think people are gonna be surprised to hear that you consume chlorine.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:06:45]:
Right. And hey, everything is about dosages. So, if you’ve got it in the right dosage, it’s absolutely okay. It’s just when we have too much of it, that becomes problematic.

Nick Urban [00:06:54]:
Yeah. Alright. Well, let’s dive into the world of oral health. Why should I care aside from aesthetic reasons that I have clean and well maintained oral health?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:07:07]:
Well, oral health is systemic health. And, Nick, you know, I’m East Indian. I come from an Ayurvedic background. We actually diagnose disease by looking at the mouth. We look at the tongue, we look at, salivary glands, we actually look inside the mouth and we’re actually able to tell what’s going on with the rest of the body. So, if I just had if I didn’t have modern technology, like, if I didn’t have blood work, if I didn’t have any of that stuff, the first thing I’d be going to is mouth, you know, because it really gives me a good idea of what’s going on.

Nick Urban [00:07:37]:
Absolutely. I remember learning about that when I was doing some cursory studying of irata, about how much you can tell from just the tongue. And then certain doctors can also tell a lot by looking at your eyes. There’s so much wisdom the body expresses through avenues that most of us would have no clue to look for.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:07:54]:
Right. Isn’t that amazing? And all, like, five thousand years ago before modern technology was invented, so it fascinates

Nick Urban [00:08:02]:
me. And there’s also a link between oral health and a lot of disease as I understand it.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:08:07]:
Absolutely. So I always see the mouth as important for two most important ways. And number one is the saliva. We now know specific bacteria that cause heart attack, diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer’s, arthritis. And believe it or not, we used to think that they all like stemmed in the gut, but actually they start in the mouth and then they go into the gut. And from the gut they into the bloodstream. So, that’s all really great, you know, finding. And now we have scientific technology that really helps us figure out if these bugs are present and also how much of them are present.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:08:39]:
And we now even know specifically how we can eradicate them without antibiotics, which is really awesome. So we get to really be proactive with disease, and prevent, which is awesome. And most importantly, we really are doing, why this is important really is because, you know, if there’s bacteria in the mouth, it’s actually a slow rate infection, right? And that’s so worse for your body. If you’re trying to optimize your body in any way, it’s like if you’re gonna get sick, I’d rather you get sick for seven to ten days and then get over it, right? It’s that low grade infection for six months, like that chronic year, two years, three years, that’s the problem. That leads to cancer. That leads to, you know, your body being sluggish, all your cellular functions breaking down, and and not my favorite, obviously, but it’s something that we really need to think about, you know, we really need to start looking at these slow rated sections instead of just looking at big things that make us six or seven to ten days. Our bodies are actually amazing at handling that stuff. It’s just low grade stuff that we really want to handle so that our bodies can gain optimal performance because everything is inflammation.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:09:45]:
We wanna lower the amount of inflammation, and that inflammation, comes from saliva and these back bacteria. The second most important way the mouth is related to peak performance, and really, how we can really lower that inflammation is functional breathing. So, that air goes through the nose, through the back of your throat, and down. What we find is that most people are mouth breathers, Right? And I almost sound like Harry Potter saying this, mouth breathers. But what we’ve found is that the functional airway is through the nose to the back of your throat and down. A lot of times, because we’re a society that’s so insured in interested in looking good, you know, our children are having braces and what those braces are doing is cramming the tongue. When the tongue gets crammed, it actually disrupts the functional airway and we get these mouth breathers. And those mouth breathers over ten to twenty years are gonna end up being sleep apnea patients.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:10:40]:
And once these patients have sleep apnea, they’re gonna have high blood pressure that leads to diabetes and leads to something else. And all these different diseases, we’re finding one of the roots of it is actually sleep apnea and that actually has to do with your tongue position.

Nick Urban [00:10:54]:
What’s your go to tongue position? On the roof of the mouth or the floor of the mouth?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:10:58]:
Always roof of the mouth. Always. And, you know, actually one of the biggest things is also even when you’re running, even when you’re running, the key is, you know, and if you wanna maximize VO two, the best way and the quality of the VO two is because we want it through the nose because we make nitric oxide. Now, nitric oxide is a, you know, it’s it’s something that your body naturally makes and why dentistry is so important and that tail position is so important is because when that tongue is at the rear of the palate, you’re gonna force your body to nose breathe. And when it nose breathes, it takes that oxygen to converts to nitric oxide. Now, that nitric oxide is going to go ahead and tell all of your hormones to work fight cancer. It’s going to help from mental clarity. It’s going to fight that oxidative stress.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:11:43]:
It’s really going to get those free radicals that are inside the body. It’s really going to help your body heal on its own, again, to give you that optimum output. So that way, things aren’t clogged up. Your cellular function, your mitochondria is working properly. You’re getting that ATP so that, you know, you can go for longer. Right? Our goal is for you to, you know, be able to have sixteen, eighteen hours a day and feel energized. That is possible. That is biohacking, and that’s what we want.

Nick Urban [00:12:10]:
Yeah. There’s so many ways of helping address mouth breathing. And I I guess it starts with realizing whether or not you are a mouth breather because most people think that they only breathe through their nose, yet upon examination, they realize, oh, no. Actually, I breathe a lot through my mouth. One way I figured that out is I used to mouth tape, and I wouldn’t actually cover my entire mouth. I would just put a vertical strip so I could still breathe if I had to, but it would mechanically hold my jaw closed. And I realized I slept a lot better. And then I realized that I was mouth breathing during the day.

Nick Urban [00:12:43]:
So I started working out, and I’d only exclusively nose breathe. And eventually, over time, I could even do my sprints and mostly breathe only through my nose. And one way it’s helpful is, like, if you’re working a laptop, you can do the same thing. You can mouth tape just a little bit. That way you don’t act inadvertently mouth breathe, and you eventually learn to nose breathe. But then again, if you have, like, nasal blockages, it’s a very hard transition to make.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:13:07]:
And and that’s actually that is very, very, very true. And I was actually gonna talk more about that too and how dentistry is related. Your tongue position is actually related to your sinuses being open. So that’s actually a really, really, really great thing. And I, you know, really like the suggestion that you have with, taking them out during the day. I feel like that’s a genius idea, and I feel like more people could do it, especially because we are a society that is on our computer so long. And we can, work from home or work in an environment where we don’t have to speak all day. So, unless you’re a dentist, that’s kind of hard.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:13:43]:
So, let’s talk about that sinus congestion, right? So, the other thing that people always think is like, hey, you know, dentistry, how is that even gonna help me with, you know, with the nose? Like, what does any of this have to do with the nose, right? So earlier I mentioned one of the key things that’s happened in society is that, you know, moms went back to work, so they weren’t breastfeeding their kids. So, if they were not breastfeeding their babies, what had happened is the tongue wasn’t being worked out. If the tongue wasn’t being worked out, the sinus cavity didn’t develop properly, neither did the tongue and the functional airway. So that’s been very common. Now, you, you know, grow these kids up a couple years and then we start wanting to make sure that they look good, so everyone has braces on, you know, and a lot of times also teeth extracted in order to be able to put braces on. And the problem with that is when you have a growing child and you actually jam somebody’s mouth shut like this, because our bones are connected to one another with sutures, we call these cranial sutures, and that’s actually where our stem cells live. So, when we jam this shut, it actually doesn’t allow the sinus cavity to grow. And then also the functional airway here isn’t able to grow properly.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:14:55]:
And believe it or not, we actually have really fun appliances that we can use to utilize in dentistry that we can actually increase your three d nasal volume without surgery, which is super exciting. And having the most amount of oxygen that is possible, the most amount of nitric oxide. I actually have a couple of, pre Olympian, cyclists that come into the practice. And, what we, you know, there are strengths. You know, their focus really is that peak performance. How do I get my VO two? You know, how do I increase it? What can I do? And how can I do it so that it’s working really well for my body? So I’m not, you know, I can do this for twenty years, thirty years. And so one of these things that, exists is an appliance that’s super cool. So it looks like this, and this is the upper arch here.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:15:42]:
So, when we expand this appliance here, what it’s going to do is expand the nasal cavity, which is right on top. And it actually expands the lower jaw and the windpipe as well. So, it actually helps increase that functional airway, which is super cool. And we’re able to, you know, find people’s tongue ties. We’re able to really help and really focus on, increasing that oxygen carrying capacity.

Nick Urban [00:16:08]:
That’s huge. And also the maximum amount you’re able to respire.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:16:13]:
Yeah. You know, because, you know, our body that respiration is so important in so many ways. Right? I mean, one of the things we think about, okay, we just need oxygen, but we forget that we need to expire. We also need to remove toxins. And that’s one of the most important things of cellular function, right? It’s not just the nutrients. It’s actually nutrients plus detoxification. And that detoxification is something we really need to look at and especially, like, now that, you know, even the air is a risk factor for heart attacks. It’s a risk factor for Alzheimer’s because there’s so many microplastics or pollution or pollutants in the air that we really need to start looking at these things.

Nick Urban [00:16:50]:
Yeah. And weight loss also happens through the breath as well. So many things happen through the breath.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:16:55]:
Absolutely. Absolutely.

Nick Urban [00:16:57]:
So what are some at home things we can do to, first of all, work on expanding our airway? I’m not sure if you’re familiar of the work with the work of doctor Weston Price, but he was also a big advocate of getting, like, whole foods and having hard things that are not necessarily easiest, soft, and squishy to chew to help build that. What are the other things that we can do?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:17:19]:
Oh, I love Weston Price. And the analogy of Weston Price is is earlier we talked about breastfeeding. So I’m just gonna digress a little bit and share a little bit about this information because it’s so cool. And if any of you have children, please pay attention to this. One of the things that happens is we talked about breastfeeding earlier because breastfeeding actually signals the entire sinus cavity to grow in the functional airway. The reason why Weston Price talks about hard foods is because the hard foods make our muscles work. And when our muscles are working, they’re stimulating the jaw, and they’re stimulating the jaw to be wide. And when the jaws are wide and formed, that’s when you get a good, nice, functional airway.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:17:55]:
And you also don’t get crooked teeth, which is pretty darn awesome as well. So, couple things I recommend, you know, for us to be able to do for our airway. Number one, and they’re gonna be very simplistic, is when you guys get home, the first thing I want you to do is shower and, you know, pick your nose. I did say that right. Yes. Pick your nose. Get all those toxins out. Get all of that crapola out for me, right off the bat.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:18:19]:
That is number one. The second thing I always say is that, put your tongue at the roof of your palate. And I would say, do box breathing. I love box breathing. You inhale for four seconds, you hold for four seconds, you exhale for four seconds, you hold for four seconds. The reason I want you doing that is because the tongue is at the roof of the palate and that functional airway is activated. Now that functional airway is activated and it’s doing a number of things. It’s decreasing your cortisol levels.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:18:51]:
It is when you’re, sitting there breathing for about twenty minutes is what I actually recommend. If you do that for twenty minutes, it will help you be more efficient. That problem you’re trying to solve or something that’s stressing you out, I promise you’ll find a solution for it. There is something about connecting our breath into the quantum being, your universe, whatever you wanna call it. Let’s, you know, let’s be friends with the universe and use it to our advantage. Right? So connecting that breath work and using that higher power, we’re actually able to be more efficient and also, it actually helps our body heal naturally. And if you wanna be at peak performance at twenty minutes, it’s gonna make a massive difference, and I really, really, really, really like that. The second thing it’s gonna do is it’s gonna make sure you get good rest, you’re gonna get good sleep.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:19:39]:
And instead of eight hours of sleep and you’re groggy, you may just get five, but you’re gonna wake up with energy. And you’re gonna wake up excited, and you’re gonna get that good REM sleep, which is that deep state of sleep, which is important for two reasons. Number one is activates a growth hormone so that your body grows properly. And the second is reparative function to make sure that your body fights heart attack, diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer’s, arthritis, and all of that. That’s why that REM sleep is really important. So when I see my patients, I’m not trying to get them to sleep eight hours. I’m like, hey, listen. I can get you a five, but I want you to be efficient.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:20:16]:
So what I wanna do is get you to five good hours of sleep and especially with that REM sleep. If I can increase the amount of REM sleep that you have, then you’re good to go. Your body is optimized. Your body is working really, really, really well.

Nick Urban [00:20:30]:
So you you like to focus on REM sleep over deep sleep?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:20:34]:
Mhmm. Yeah. Deep is you know, REM is actually more powerful than deep. I know most of the Oura rings and things like that are looking at that, and they’re really looking at deep sleep. But that deep sleep versus that REM REM is called rapid eye movement. That’s when your body’s entirely paralyzed. It’s paralyzed for a reason. It’s focused on healing.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:20:56]:
And, earlier, I talked about sleep apnea, because people with sleep apnea or mouth breathers guess what’s most compromised with them, is the REM sleep. And that REM sleep is compromised, which is what actually leads to a lot of diseases. Anxiety is a common factor. If people have anxiety, you need more REM sleep. The other thing, and I’m just digressing here, so feel free to stop me here. The other thing I really like to focus on is vitamin levels. You know, earlier you made a really great comment about being at the computer desk and really being able to take her mouth, and that’s fantastic. But that also means we’re at the computer desk and not outside.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:21:34]:
So, we’re not getting that vitamin D. And that vitamin D is critical for all of our hormones to work properly, and our hormones are a signal light that tell our body to work properly, and also get rid of disease. So, if we want our bodies to work properly, then we have to make sure that we’ve got the good precursors. So, if we have good vitamin D, good vitamin B12, b one, b five, and then the b fifty, he’s like, you’re in great shape. That’s the best way to make sure your gut’s gonna stay healthy, you’re mentally clear, you’re gonna get that good sleep, and you’re just present. Have you ever met those people, like, when you meet them, you’re like, well, what are they smoking? They have so much energy. They’re, like, never tired. And it’s because they’ve got, everything in balance and they’re actually utilizing their body to be super efficient, using their natural raw ingredients that we actually really need.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:22:27]:
So.

Nick Urban [00:22:28]:
Yeah. That’s very important. You I don’t think you can get all your other vitamins aside from vitamin d outside, and also there’s genetic variability there. And, like, depending on your your location in the world, how far North south you are, that’ll determine things. Also, your skin color, so many factors. But in general, there’s a ton of reasons to go outside, vitamin d being one of the many. So I’m with you on that. And if you don’t mind an occasional weird look, you can still tape your mouth and nose breathe as you go on your your afternoon walk.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:22:55]:
Absolutely. Absolutely. You know what? We’ve been through COVID. We can put on a mask if you’re embarrassed. No worries. You know?

Nick Urban [00:23:03]:
Yeah. Exactly. Okay. So those are some things that we can do. Are there any good diagnostics you like for the mouth, whether that’s, like, looking at the tongue and seeing a certain color, it’s looking at the eyes, maybe it’s a blood panel? Because you mentioned that, like, chronic low grade infections being a potential problem, and that might be one way you’d see this manifest. Are there any, like, markers you like to look for?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:23:27]:
Absolutely. So one of the things that we use, we actually use a company called Oral DNA, and, we look at we actually take a spit test. And what we’re able to see is two things. Number one, I wanna see your genetic risk. What is your genetic risk for inflammation? What is your genetic risk for heart attack, diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer’s, arthritis, all of that stuff? And then the second is the specific bacteria. So, that’s the, you know, like as a blood panel, that’s what I use in the practice. Now, secondly, when I look in the mouth, just visually, if I’m looking at somebody, I mean, I know we’ve talked about this quite a bit, but the first thing I look at is the tongue. Because, you know, you you’ll actually notice some people when they’re talking, all you see is their tongue.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:24:09]:
So as long as as soon as I see all I can see is their tongue, I can pretty much bet that they’re a mouth breather. I can pretty much bet that they have a dry mouth. I can pretty much bet that they’ve got a red lining around their gums, which tells me that there’s some of these low grade infection bacteria are around. So that’s the first thing that I really look at. The red lining around the gums, obviously, when you’re flossing, if you’re bleeding, that’s, you know, obviously a big sign there as well. The one thing I wanna bring people’s attention to is on number one, looking at the tongue, you know, really making sure that we’re tongue scraping on a daily basis because our body is detoxing. And so scraping that tongue, getting rid of all that gunk on the tongue, that’s super important. The second thing I’m also looking at is really making sure that your mouth is not dry.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:24:56]:
That’s the one thing people are not talking about is a dry mouth. Now, dry mouth is caused by many reasons. One, including like anti anxiety medications, right? That’s one reason that happens. Too much caffeine will do it too, believe it or not. You know, not just alcohol, but too much caffeine will do it, you know, being in certain environments where it’s super dry will do that as well. So there’s a lot of reasons for the dry mouth and all of those that dryness is what’s creating all these bacteria to overgrow. So, I’m always looking at these telltale signs, you know, whether I can see the tongue, whether I can see some, you know, redness around the gums, or whether it’s a dry mouth. These are all telltale signs for me that there is a problem and something needs to be done.

Nick Urban [00:25:39]:
Yeah. It’s counterintuitive that a dry mouth would lead to more bacterial overgrowth, pathogenic bacterial overgrowth and be undesirable. But, yeah, you’re right. And some of these, like, seemingly innocuous side effects of medications and supplements and things, such as a dry mouth, aren’t actually as innocent as they seem.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:25:58]:
No. Dry mouth is actually it’s, we always used to think dry mouth was for old people, you know, if they’re in their sixties and seventies or eighties. But in all honesty, now I’m finding it more and more even in the younger generation. And it’s mainly because a lot of them, you know, if you look at Instagram or if you look at Kim Kardashian, you know, how are they smiling with the, you know, their mouths open, right? So everyone feels like it’s sexy to keep their mouths open or breathe through their mouth and, you know, really creates that dry environment, which, causes a lot of problems. So

Nick Urban [00:26:29]:
I wanna know your take on certain other practices. I already heard that you are a fan of tongue scraping, and I’ve been doing that for a while. Usually in the mornings, do you do it how many times a day do you do it?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:26:39]:
I do it every time I brush your teeth, tongue scrape.

Nick Urban [00:26:42]:
Okay. So most

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:26:42]:
of the times there. Twice a day. Yes. At a minimum. Yeah.

Nick Urban [00:26:45]:
Gotcha. And then also, what’s your take on oil pulling, whether with sesame oil or coconut oil?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:26:51]:
I tend to like coconut oil. And the reason I tend to like, coconut oil is because it’s a better binder. So if anybody thinks you’re, you know, oil pulling because you are, you know, trying to make your teeth better, that’s not the case. So the real case for oil pulling is actually systolic health. The reason we wanna oil pull is because, you know, earlier we talked about detoxification. Right? And so what happens with detoxification is that things are come out of our body in certain ways. You’re gonna, you know, you’re gonna breathe it out, you’re gonna sweat it out, you’re gonna pee it out, you’re gonna poop it out. Those are the ways that we actually know of.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:27:25]:
Now, oil pulling is another way we can pull out the toxins in our body. And so, when we are swishing around the mouth, oil, especially coconut oil, is a great binder. And what that does is if there’s any metal, mercury, anything like that that’s in the body, mold, anything that’s in the body, what it’s gonna do as you’re swishing, swishing, pushing, underneath your tongue, there’s a lot of blood vessels. So the reason why we do it for twenty minutes is because you’re getting that blood to circulate and you’re getting that coconut oil to bind. And as it binds, you’re gonna, you know, pull the toxin out of your system and then you’re gonna spit it out into a bucket. So that’s the whole reason for oil pulling. I’m a big fan of it. If you for systemic purposes, I’m a big fan of coconut, oil pulling.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:28:13]:
Sesame oil, however, is great for your gums only. So if you’re gonna use sesame oil, put it on your fingers and massage your gums. It actually does help with gum health. So if you wanted to do something, if you had, like, gum disease and that was your focus, I would say use a sesame oil or rub it on your gums and go to sleep. That’s fantastic. But if you are looking for a binder, if your whole, reason is I wanna be better health overall, then I would use it as a binder. And I would do the twenty minutes of coconut oil and having it pull out any toxins that are in the body.

Nick Urban [00:28:50]:
Ayurveda mentioned using coconut oil only for, like, one third of the constitutions, and sesame oil was the most universal as far as I remember. Do you know why?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:29:00]:
You know what? Sesame oil so in Ayurveda, sesame oil has been used for eons. It’s one it’s more cost effective. But when I am taught through organizations like the Amazonian Institute on how to prevent heart attacks or if I’m looking at, Recope, which is red Alzheimer’s, what we find is we’re looking for stronger, we’re looking for stronger binders. And we look at the binders especially because, you know, Iravena has been around for five thousand years. Right? And so things are a little different now. They didn’t have to deal with microplastics. They didn’t have to deal with a lot of stuff that we did. Right? And so that we do now.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:29:34]:
And so when we’re looking at what, like, how society is today, and especially with mold. Right? Mold wasn’t, like, our beta didn’t care about mold. It was, like, never a thing, you know? And now one of the biggest concerns we have is mold toxicity. So when we’re looking at pulling out all those toxins, whether it’s mold, whether it’s metal, whether it’s mercury, or any or microplastics, we’re really looking at coconut oil because it’s a better binder because everything has affinity. Right? So when we’re looking at the affinity affinity of coconut oil, because it is anti it it is fungicidal. It does kill, fungus as well. So the reason for using the coconut oil is that it tends to be more universal in getting all the toxins out of the body.

Nick Urban [00:30:16]:
On that note, are there any issues with using it very frequently developed like, the bacteria in your mouth developing resistance against it? And or what are your thoughts on using, like, a c eight MCT oil like caprylic acid, because that has, like, very even stronger antimicrobial activity.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:30:33]:
You know, my tend to my the way I like to do is everything in moderation, including moderation. So, you know, I tend to be stick to the basics. Don’t make it too complicated. Not everything needs to be or, you know, like, we wanna optimize enough, but we don’t wanna optimize over optimize and then have a problem somewhere else. Right? So that’s the thing is, like, we gotta be strategic about this. My preference is coconut oil. It’s proven, data driven. It’s work I mean, I love m c two o, but I I don’t I personally, there hasn’t been two hundred years of research around it or a hundred years of research.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:31:03]:
Right? So that’s the reason why I tend to, like, coconut oil. I feel like it’s predictable. It works well. Like, it works really, really, really great. So why mess with it? You know? And especially because of the multifactorial properties it has. You know? The last thing I wanna do with MCT oil is increase my risk for a heart attack. Right? Because absorption is greater. Right? So just things like that.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:31:25]:
Just really looking at we just don’t have all the information, all the data that exists, around that. So, call me basic, but I I tend to stick with the the the coconut oil.

Nick Urban [00:31:37]:
Okay. So then on that same thread, what about mouthwash? Commercial alcohol, ethanol included mouthwash.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:31:46]:
Well, I’ll I’ll have to say this, Nick. All the mouthwash is a bunch of cock.

Nick Urban [00:31:51]:
You

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:31:51]:
don’t need it.

Nick Urban [00:31:53]:
Yeah.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:31:53]:
So marketing companies are out there telling you to feel fresh and all this other stuff. Honestly, you could do that with flossing, brushing your teeth, and tongue scraping. You’re actually gonna feel better with a tongue scraper getting all that stuff off than you are gonna be with a mouthwash. So my preference is no mouthwash. And honestly, definitely no alcohol. If you’re gonna use a mouthwash, you know, the people I recommend mouthwashes on are patients who have dry mouth, right? Those because it has a lipid substitute saliva in it. So I I would say for those patients. Or sometimes I recommend mouthwashes for patients who are immunocompromised.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:32:30]:
They either have, some sort of autoimmune condition or they have, like cancer or something along those condition or they have, like cancer or something along those lines. In those areas or when there’s certain patients who have those things, I actually recommend the OraCare, which I mentioned earlier, which creates that chloride ion, and it actually creates that gas. And the reason I like that mouthwash is because it gets in under underneath all the restorations. So if you have, like, a bunch of crowns or if somebody, you know, had 28 crowns or something like that, that’s what we what we would want in order to maintain, you know, the dental work that’s been done and also clean in surface areas we can’t access.

Nick Urban [00:33:07]:
Yeah. I’ve also seen research that if you use alcohol containing mouthwash, you’re gonna kill the bacteria that help convert nitrate. I think it’s nitrate into nitric oxide, which leads to a greater chance of cardiovascular events and other nasty consequences.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:33:23]:
That is true. That is true. The entire microboid biome gets, you know, challenged because, you know, think about alcohol. We use, like, alcohol to wipe down surfaces. Right? So we’re using that because we wanna kill all bacteria. With the mouth, we wanna be selective. We just wanna kill the bad ones, let the good ones live because the good ones are actually good for us. We wanna optimize those.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:33:43]:
We want more of those suckers, you know?

Nick Urban [00:33:45]:
Yes.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:33:46]:
So, I would actually say ditch the mouthwash and pick up a oral probiotic or oral lozenge. That would be my preference. It is like the, you know, the old days were about mouthwash. I feel like the new is my favorite one that I really love is a lozenge called, from Biogaya. It’s called ProDentist, and I love it because usually it has, minty flavor on it. So it’s really, really, really nice. So that’s really great.

Nick Urban [00:34:10]:
And it’s got probiotics in it?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:34:11]:
Yeah. And it’s got good probiotics in it too.

Nick Urban [00:34:15]:
Yeah. And do those colonize or last, or are they just very transient?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:34:18]:
The way I like to look at the oral microbiome is like a pond or a swamp. Right? So, when the mouth is dry, we’re going towards a swamp. Right? When the mouth is moist, we’re staying in the pond area. Right? And if you have a pond, you have these beautiful crayfishes and everything’s really dandy, you want to feed them. You want to keep them around. Right? Yeah. And that’s what the oral probiotics do is they really just help populate good bacteria in the mouth. And they’re highly specific too.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:34:43]:
The strains that go inside are really good. And what we what that also does is when we have high strains of good bacteria, it actually kills the bad ones.

Nick Urban [00:34:51]:
Yes.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:34:52]:
So that balance still stays, which is what we like.

Nick Urban [00:34:54]:
Yeah. And that happens in the gut too.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:34:56]:
Yes. Absolutely. And and hence, the reason we talked about the vitamin d earlier too, we wanted to talk about vitamin d as a precursor because it is not only important in, you know, having all your hormones work properly, it’s also very important in your sleep, but also for your gut health. There’s some specific bacteria that you cannot sustain if you don’t have good vitamin d.

Nick Urban [00:35:15]:
Interesting. Yeah. Okay. What about using a Waterpik? Are you a fan of that or do you prefer traditional floss?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:35:24]:
Oh, I love the Waterpik. I feel like that’s fantastic. I mean, like, you know, I mean, I’m a flosser, but it’s because I’m also a dentist, you know? But I’m in San Francisco and I have to realize everyone here loves a gadget. So, I actually really like the, Waterpik. I feel like it works fantastic. And then what I tend to do is if I have certain patients, with certain diseases that I’m concerned about, we actually can put things inside the water pick to help. For example, sometimes we can put a little bit of hydrogen peroxide, like, maybe eight ounces of water and maybe just a little, you know, maybe one fourth teaspoon of hydrogen peroxide so we can use that in the water pick.

Nick Urban [00:36:02]:
Is that food grade hydrogen peroxide?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:36:04]:
Yeah. Yeah. So you can use hydrogen peroxide. It dilutes it, and it’s great for patients who tend to, build up a lot more, you know, gum disease bacteria. I I find it’s very gentle. It works really great. It keeps your oral biome super healthy. So I tend to really like that.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:36:22]:
A lot of times, sometimes we use ozone water. Oh, yeah.

Nick Urban [00:36:24]:
I was gonna ask you about ozone.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:36:25]:
Yeah. So, we use a lot of ozone in our in our in dentistry. I love it. It’s great. Ozone is extra oxygen, and you can never go wrong without oxygen. So and especially, being able to use you ozone is actually also good at killing specific bacteria. That’s the other reason I really like it. So I really like to use ozonated water, especially in gum, you know, deep gum cleanings and also, cleanings in general.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:36:49]:
I also like ozone oil. There’s specific ozone oils, to put underneath the gums that helps, maintain good healthy microbiome and make sure that everything’s working well.

Nick Urban [00:36:58]:
Nice. So I’m glad to hear that on both counts because I use a Waterpik, and I was hoping you weren’t gonna take that away from me. And I also have an ozone generator here that I don’t really use that much for oral reasons, but I could see it being a very powerful intervention and a lot better than some of the traditional ways that the mouth was cleaned.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:37:16]:
Absolutely. It’s amazing. And, you know, if you have a ozone generator at home, honestly, I would drink with ozone water. Yeah. Like, especially first thing in the morning when you wake up, that ozone is just I mean, that it’s that oxidative stress, it’s gonna help you get rid of that. Find all those free radicals. It’s just so amazing. You know, just make sure you don’t take any multivitamins or any sort of medications four hours before and four hours after.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:37:38]:
But it’s amazing. So, I would highly recommend, even ozonated water.

Nick Urban [00:37:42]:
Yeah. My reason I don’t do that is because I have a molecular hydrogen machine, the aquacure. And so I have hydrogen water in the morning, and having an oxidative and a reductive therapies, like, to cancel each other and probably gonna make both of them much less effective.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:37:56]:
Yep. Well, that’s great.

Nick Urban [00:37:59]:
Cool. What are the other things that you think are important to discuss? The tools or the mistakes people make when it comes to oral care?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:38:07]:
The number one thing I would say that people mistake for for the oral care is they don’t think they should go in often. They don’t see it hurt or you can’t see a biofilm. You know, you’re not going to be able to see sweaters on your teeth, you know, it may feel a little funny or whatnot, but you’d be so surprised. There are some patients who, look amazing, like they’re physically fit, they’re doing really great and all of that stuff, and then all of a sudden will find all of these bad bugs in their mouth. It’s because a lot of them maybe they’re athletes, or some of them are just have sleep apnea or something along those lines, and you just never know. And then the second is the sleep piece too, is that people always forget that, you know, we as we get older, we get wrinkles and so does our tongue because it’s a muscle. Isn’t it get wrinkles too? So by 40 we start developing signs of upper air resistance and then which leads to sleep apnea. So getting to those things earlier is super critical and to make that connection with the mouth, you know, because medical doctors aren’t looking at this stuff and neither are a lot of dentists, frankly.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:39:14]:
So, we really wanna pay attention and really look at what is going on and be more in tune because I feel like all the listeners out there are probably really in tune because that’s where they’re listening to this podcast. They’re more aware. And just paying attention to these simple signs, is really, really important and a big clue to overall health.

Nick Urban [00:39:34]:
Let’s go more into exploring the reason that this is such an important area to focus and how it really impacts systemic health. Because when I first heard it described to me as, like, if you have an overgrowth of certain bacteria in your mouth and every time you’re eating the food, it might be the most clean, pristine, healthy, organic, biodynamic regenerative food. But if you’re if you have an infection or an overgrowth and every time you’re taking a bite, you’re swallowing that, you’re gonna increase your, like, inflammatory load and you’re gonna be, like, putting a lot more load and strain in your body than if you didn’t have that.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:40:09]:
Absolutely. Absolutely, Nick. That’s a great point. So, just naturally on a regular day, we’re swallowing five gallons of bacteria. Now, that’s a lot. Five gallons is insane. That’s a lot of buckets, right? And so, think about, like, those five gallons, you actually have more saliva than you actually have food, right? And, the whole purpose of saliva is to help break down that food, create that nitric oxide. That whole purpose of saliva is to kill off any fungus, kill off any bacteria, anything like that that may be problematic.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:40:41]:
That’s the whole purpose of saliva. Now, if the saliva doesn’t work, you know, because it’s got so many bad bugs in it, Like, the food doesn’t even matter because the quality just went down by 70%. Because the things, it’s like, you know, the perfect example I like to use is let’s say for somebody, you know, who had the methylation gene and they weren’t able to methylate something and we’ll use vitamin D3 as an example. So, you take your vitamin D3, but you can’t convert it into usable vitamin D3, right? And so, that’s an issue because what good is taking that vitamin D3 if your body can’t utilize it? And the thing with food is that food is not actually the the final product, right? We’re bringing that food down into glucose. And that glucose is what our body actually uses to make ATP. So, really, making sure that our saliva is healthy, making sure it doesn’t have the bad bugs, it’s gonna optimize, all the food that you eat and it’s gonna work much better. So and the quality of food you’re gonna get is gonna be much better, especially, you know, leafy grains. You know, leafy greens are your main source of nitric oxide, which is amazing, you, you know, and just really being able to make sure that it gets digested.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:41:54]:
So we don’t want any leafy greens with e coli in it. We don’t want any leafy greens. I mean, all this stuff we hear about TB all the time about like, you know, carrots are recalled. This is recalled. This is recalled. This is recalled. Do you know what I mean? So, you know, our bodies are designed to function and our saliva is designed to help us. It’s designed to kill all those suckers off so that we can be also.

Nick Urban [00:42:16]:
How important do you think it is to really, like, if you get produced to wash it with, say, hydrogen peroxide or ozone or vinegar or something to potentially root reduce the pathogenic load on the food, and then also you’re gonna be, I guess, by nature of those cleansing products also reducing the amount of, like, pesticides and herbicides and other things on the food.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:42:38]:
It’s really, really, really important because we now know that a lot of the diseases from pesticides and herbicides and things like that. But, you know, I have to say what I tend to do for myself is because remember, I don’t like a pharmaceutical or a nature school. I really want, like, everything to be working on its own. So, what I tend to do, like, my cilantro or, like, my veggies and stuff, I tend to soak it. I just leave it in water for about twenty minutes because we know that there’s osmosis occurring. So, what that’s gonna do is start pulling out all the bad stuff, and I’m not using any chemicals. I’m not using any, like, additive, for those reasons. And I’m keeping its, chemistry the same, right? I’m getting drunk because that’s what it’s about is keeping that chemistry to be the same.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:43:17]:
So if I soak, you know, my vegetables and I let it sit for twenty minutes and then I take everything out, you know, and throw away. And then I do actually a lot of times, I’ll do that about three times. Whether it’s, you know, eggplant are my favorite. I love eggplants. Whether it’s a salad, but just doing it multiple times, it really makes a difference. And also, the food quality is way better. It it’s just I feel like the nutrients are, you know, a lot more dense. And my husband and I actually own a hydroponic plant in our home.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:43:46]:
We love, love, love that, because, you know, that’s pretty easy. I don’t have to worry about, you know, if this rinses at once and it’s good to go. But, you know, if you know, outside food or even the farmer’s market, where we get organic food, I tend to wash it several times before. And I tell tend to like to soak it in water, is usually, you know, my my way of doing it. And I’m blessed to have my mom cook with me, which is so fun because she’s a small Indian woman who loves to cook. So literally, everything is so fresh and, like, you know, the food is the fruit, like, as I said, vegetables are laid out, they’re cut, they’re, you know, they can actually, you know, she’s retired. She’s got time, so she really enjoys, putting it all together. So, but if I was somebody on the go, I would say the best thing is, my and my husband and I do is just a meal planning portion too.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:44:35]:
Just if you’re gonna wash everything, start maybe, you know, we go to the farmer’s market on Saturday mornings. So as soon as we come back from this, the farmer’s market, everything’s washed and laid out. So that way before it even goes in the fridge, we don’t wait to use it. We just clean it as soon as it comes in the house. Kind of like come home and shower, same process with our food too.

Nick Urban [00:44:53]:
Yeah. Is water enough to get, like, strip off the herbicides and pesticides and rodenticides and all that stuff?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:44:59]:
I think when I’m doing I haven’t tested it, so I don’t wanna say that I have. I know enough about it, but when I soak them for twenty minutes because of the osmosis aspect of it, I do find that it’s I don’t find any sort of problems with it. And it’s mainly because of you know, I think it’s also, you know, we’re doing it three times too. Right? It’s not just a one soak. It’s you’re doing one soak, a second soak, and a third soak. And by that time, I’m not finding any sort of, problems with it. But I, you know, I’d be curious to see if they would test that out and see what we find what they would find in it.

Nick Urban [00:45:29]:
Yeah. Yeah. It’d be cool. I think it would probably wouldn’t change the chemistry much if you use, like, vinegar or hydrogen peroxide and just soaked it. Like, maybe not even soak it. Just, like, rinse it off with that, and then then soak it in water afterward.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:45:41]:
Because I tried some of that stuff before and, you know, I I feel like it’s just something that if it feels good for you, do it. If it doesn’t, then, you know, then not. For me, it just felt like it was an extra step. Was but then washing it three times is two. Right? So it’s like, you know, like so I feel like whatever works, you know, it actually is absolutely a okay, okay, you know? And then just finding what tends to fit your schedule too. Right? So

Nick Urban [00:46:07]:
Exactly. I think, like, there’s a lot of other lower hanging fruit than, like, triple or quadruple or washing your produce with some special solutions. Probably more impactful to focus on oil pulling or something like that than it is to do this. And if you have the ability, sure, like, bonus points to do it all.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:46:24]:
The good thing is, you know, I’m hoping that, as time progresses, we’re becoming more and more aware of the quality of food and that there will be more and more regulations around the things that go into it. And we’re not and we’re actually more hydroponics. Like, I’d love to see more of that. I know I’ve seen a couple of articles where in certain countries they’ve started hydroponic, farms where the soil quality is so much better, and they’re not having to use pesticides and herbicides and stuff like that. So, I would love to see the quality food quality change in our especially in San Francisco because believe it or not, when I go to Europe, I have no problems with a lot of the food. And here, I tend to be a little bit more mindful about what I eat and what I or how much of it I eat too.

Nick Urban [00:47:04]:
Yeah. Different regulatory landscape. A lot more things are approved here that are completely banned and have been banned over there. So, it’s it’s not like comparing apples to apples.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:47:14]:
No. Not at all. And, you know, even like in dentistry, you know, all the dyes, right, they were, you know, causing ADHD and just all the things. And that’s the thing is, like, we just don’t know enough. And and that’s the thing is I mean, I love biochemistry. It was one of my favorite topics in dental, you know, and actually undergrad not dental dental school. But, you know, just learning about how the composition of things change, but also looking at how it reacts with our body. It’s just that when we change when we introduce one hydrogen, it completely can change your reaction, right? And so, it’s it’s made me think, you know, two, three times before I I start adding stuff and and stuff like that.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:47:52]:
So I try to be as natural as possible. Less is more is my, you know, motto, I guess.

Nick Urban [00:47:58]:
In In your hydroponic setup, are you adding back all a lot of the stuff that’s missing? Because I know a lot of people just add, like, the NPK, fertilizer. Are you adding, like, like, the minerals and trace minerals and that kind of stuff as well?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:48:09]:
You know, the, company that I use, they actually send us, the trace minerals for sure that goes inside there. So it works beautifully. And then, where, you know, the area that we have, where the hydroponics sits, it’s literally, like, it gets so much sun. So it’s like natural lighting versus actually utilizing the lights itself because it self adjusts, which is really awesome. So I find that, yeah, the answer to your question is yes. We do put the trace minerals in.

Nick Urban [00:48:36]:
Because in my local grocers, I’ll see some products that say they were proudly grown in in a hydroponic medium. And then I thought to myself, like, that doesn’t tell me anything about the quality of the setup they have. And I’m wondering if it’s gonna be more or less nutritious than soil. At least with soil, there’s, like, some level of standards.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:48:55]:
Well, the biggest thing with soil is also the, you know, nitrogen fixation. Right? We talk about nitric oxide, and we wanna break that down into nitric oxide and stuff. So because that you know, the nitrogen fixation is where the soil the nitrogen goes in the soil and then into that through the plants through photosynthesis. But, you know, with the hydroponics, they actually have I’m pretty certain that they have, fertilize not fertilizer, but trace minerals and things like that that go inside it. But, also, the one thing that I find that makes a big difference with the hydroponics is the quality of water. Because you’re not just using tap water. Right? And I feel like that’s making the biggest difference is that the water that we’re using is, like, distilled, and so the all the, you know, all the junk is taken out of the water. So I feel like that’s what’s really making the bigger difference.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:49:41]:
So but that’s just my 2¢. I could be completely wrong.

Nick Urban [00:49:44]:
No. I think I think in your case, you’re right. I don’t know what the large companies do if they’re using really high quality water or if they’re using just tap water. I wanna hope that they’re not using just tap water. But you also are able to better control against the environmental contamination such as, unfortunately, what’s going on in California and the produce that’s grown there and that extremely off the charts high levels of toxins. They’re now gonna be in the produce, in the soil for a long time to come.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:50:13]:
Absolutely. Absolutely. And and that’s the challenging part is because our, you know, our climate has just changed so much. It’s just, say, changed so dramatically, and it’s continued to change, and it’s changing rapidly, where we just don’t have all the information that we need in order to, you know, are we living you know, we’re doing the best we can. It’s just that there’s so many variables that, you know, we just don’t know. And then, you know, and then like the soil, you know, all the wildfires in Southern California, you know, that’s not just gonna impact. It’s a ten year cycle, you know? You know, it’s like the next generation’s gonna feel it.

Nick Urban [00:50:47]:
Well, Doctor. Nami, we can talk about this for a very long time. I wanna get back to dentistry because I’m sure my audience is gonna have a lot of questions about what we’ve covered so far. And are there any other important links to know? Like, of course, there’s ties to systemic full body health. Are there any conditions that are very strongly linked to the mouth or oral health in general?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:51:10]:
Absolutely. The biggest two ones that we wanted actually three don’t say. There are well, I guess five they were. Right? I was like, wait a minute. Number one, a heart attack prevention. Super important. Sleep apnea is the number one precursor for heart attacks as well as a specific bacteria. And there is, you know, bacteria by AA acting in my CSAT is actually causative for, heart attacks.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:51:32]:
So, definitely number one for that. Second is Alzheimer’s. PG primitilaginifolus is a specific bacteria that is causative for Alzheimer’s. And I can say and vouch for this one because I actually dissected, you know, brains of people with gum disease, and we would find this PGE that’s a snake like bacteria. When we put it under histological slide, we would find them, which is insane. Right? So

Nick Urban [00:51:56]:
what you’re saying is there’s this bacteria in the mouth when you have these infections, and then it gets into the bloodstream, goes systemic, goes to the heart, or it goes to the brain. So some bacteria that start in your mouth works its way into other organ systems.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:52:08]:
Yep. Exactly. So, you know, like, let me use this example, Nick. So, like, one of the reasons we got COVID, right, was because it got passed through our defenses. So PG is so small that it passes a blood brain barrier. And that’s how it enters a brain. Yeah. And it also, believe it or not, enters joints because joints are pretty tight spaces.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:52:31]:
Right? Our bodies are designed to protect it, but over time, it keeps breaking out that lining. It gets into the joints and goes through our filtration system, basically. And that’s how we find arthritis a lot too. So, yeah, these specific guys are, I mean, they’re, it’s, if we look at the pathophysiology and the way that they work, we can really see how these big life bugs can get into our brains and into other parts of our bodies and stuff. So that would be the biggest ones I would have to start with. I feel like I made everyone sad by talking about this thing. Iim so sorry. But itis so important to know the mouth is really important to the rest of the body and especially because, you know, we are no longer dying at 60.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:53:09]:
We’re living 80 is the new 60, right? And I feel like you and I are probably similar in ages. We’re gonna go to 120, right? And if we’re gonna live to 120, our goal is to go out and say, Universe, this was a great ride. Peace out. We don’t want disease. I mean, I don’t want a stroke. I don’t want a cancer. I don’t want a heart attack. I don’t want any of that stuff.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:53:28]:
I wanna live life on my own terms and have that confidence in health. And I wanna do what I meant, you you know, what I’m here on this world to do, which is my purpose is to help people live a longer ritual life through keeping their teeth. Right? And understanding the oral systemic connection because that’s what excites me. The quality of life is what we’re really looking for. And that’s where we’re constantly wanting to optimize, not just from, like, you know, bacteria in the mouth, but also, hey, breathing impacts our anxiety levels. You know, our sleepings, you know, impacts our anxiety levels. So just really making sure that we’re looking at this from all the aspects. The mouth is so important, you know.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:54:06]:
We kiss other people. We show affection. We hear stories of affirmation. We smile and take those selfies. It’s our self esteem. Right? So there’s so many other components that come along with our mouth and teeth that we really, really should give it the attention it deserves.

Nick Urban [00:54:25]:
I also wonder if so many of the, quote, random heart attacks people have in cardiovascular events despite their LDL and cholesterol levels being totally normal. I wonder if there’s gonna like, there’s a connection between oral health that is much more prevalent than the researchers realize, and then it makes me wonder about other facets of health outside just the mouth. But, like, how many of these connections are there that will eventually figure out were there the whole time and they actually explain what has otherwise gone as a random occurrence.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:55:00]:
The most important is a tongue. The big, fat tongue as we talk about. Oh, that’s snoring and sleep apnea. That is the number one correlation that there is. And, you know, medical doctors donit screen for it. Itis not even on their radar. Like, somebody will gain 20 pounds. Theyill give them a high, you know, thyroid medication but wonit look at like, hey, did you happen to have sleep apnea? You know, and believe it or not, people who have sleep apnea also have low thyroid too because it’s a stress on their system, their entire system.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:55:32]:
So, you know, that’s, especially heart attacks, strokes, all of those things. And it’s not even just about, you know, high LDL high LDL or lipoprotein a. A lot of it has to sleep, you know, sleep apnea is a major precursor, as well as oral for airway resistance.

Nick Urban [00:55:51]:
Do people generally know if they have this? I think I’ve heard somewhere that most sleep apnea goes undiagnosed.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:55:56]:
It is, and people don’t know about it unless they’re screening. Like, I’m screening for it all the time, and people are always in denial, by the way. I don’t have it. My sleep is great. So, okay. Let’s just test it. I mean, we’ll just put a ring on you and it’ll test it. You know, tell us your oxygen saturation levels.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:56:10]:
And, you know, even thank God there’s been, you know, like, the Oura ring is great and everything like that. It’s creating a lot of awareness, but it it’s actually deeper than that. That’s just the tip. That’s just the surface of, you know, to to understand it. But people are just thinking, oh, I’ll sleep when I’m dead. And, you know, I’m like, let’s not get you there, you know? So, you know, again, the goal is to even if I can get good five hours of sleep, that REM sleep, so that your body can heal itself, that’s gonna be far more effective than, you know, eight to ten hours of at night sleep or, you know, a restless sleep or anything like that. So Well,

Nick Urban [00:56:46]:
it’s a good way to tie it together.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:56:49]:
Yeah. And people just forget that tongue is so important. It’s part of your airway. You know, it’s not just dentistry. It’s like that’s your entire morale because if you can’t live without breathing, you know, you can go without food, you can go without water, Try living without air. You got eight minutes.

Nick Urban [00:57:04]:
Okay. So I’m guessing that having clean quality air is pretty important to you as, like, a baseline because if you don’t have a filter, then you are the filter. But then what else? How else should we be taking care of our tongue in addition to the basic tongue scraping and tooth brushing and keeping it on the roof of our mouth when we’re going about our day?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:57:26]:
Right. The most important thing you can do for your tongue is, tongue training exercises. Anybody over 40, your tongue is gonna start getting wrinkles. It’s going to start collapsing. It’s just a given. So you can do tongue training exercises. My favorite one is, hey, if you’re driving, stick your tongue out at somebody. That is actually a tongue training exercise, believe it or not.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:57:48]:
So, I find that super funny. The other one that’s really great is, like, clacking your tongue. Yeah. And you can do that about, like, 20 to 50 times. It’s a push up for the tongue, so it’s pretty fantastic. You can also put your tongue to each side and stretch it out. And you’ll realize the sides of the tongue get stretched. So, that is really fantastic as well.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:58:12]:
So, those are some simple ones, that you can do that really help out. And then, you know, I’ve always had patients who tell me, because we make them do myofunctional therapy and stuff like that, so, you know, they always laugh. They’re like, it’s Friday night, and all their friends will come over, and they’ll have a ball of wine, and then everyone’s sticking their tongues out and doing myofunctional therapy. So, hey, it could be entertainment too.

Nick Urban [00:58:33]:
How often are you doing these tongue exercises? Daily? Multiple times a day?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:58:37]:
I’d say two minutes a day.

Nick Urban [00:58:39]:
Two minutes. Okay.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:58:40]:
Yeah. And you can pick one. So if you just feel like sticking your tongue out of people while you’re driving, feel free to do that for two minutes.

Nick Urban [00:58:46]:
And if you get really advanced, you can oil pull and do the tongue exercises at the same time.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:58:51]:
Right. Right. Right.

Nick Urban [00:58:53]:
Nice. Okay. We’ve covered a lot of ground. What else is there? Like, any correlations between, like, longevity and either tongue health or overall oral health?

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:59:04]:
Yeah. Absolutely. Well, let’s start with that one first. That’s a great question. You know, keeping your teeth is kinda important. You know, keeping your teeth as an extra ten years to your life, that’s a hands down fact. Like, I don’t we don’t even have to go it’s, like, scientifically proven. The reason for that is because when you’re getting those leafy greens, you’re able to chew.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:59:20]:
When you’re able to chew, you get that nitric oxide. So, super important with that. So, we really want to be able to make sure, yeah, you are, chewing. The second thing is also making sure you don’t have metal or mercury fillings in your mouth or root canals that are bad because that’s that low grade infection. When there’s mercury fillings in the mouth, it will make fungus overgrow in the body, and it’ll actually increase it. And the fungus is the hardest one to get rid of. So really being mindful of not having that fungus overgrowth and that metal toxicity that’s inside the mouth. Now, the other one is, we talked about the metal root canals.

Dr. Namrata Patel [00:59:56]:
Now, root canals, they’re if you do them in the recent years, they’re far better than when they were done twenty years ago. Now, because we have laser technology, if the root canal is done with a laser, we actually can kill off these bad bugs that cause low rate brain infections. So, it’s fine. But if you’ve had a root canal done over ten years ago, get it checked out because one of the biggest things I find in patients who have have autoimmune conditions or who have, cancer, honestly, they have a low grade infection with root canals. And so once we, you know, get rid of that, low grade infection, there are, you know, chances they improve dramatically because, again, their body’s reserves are better. They’re not busy fighting this little low grade infection. It’s actually able to attack that cancer cell, you know? So it’s about the resources that your body has to utilize.

Nick Urban [01:00:42]:
Yeah. It’s such a good point too because there’s a lot of instances where, yeah, the body can really handle this just fine, but it only has so many resources. It’s handling this fine, but then that means the resources that were going elsewhere are no longer going there.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:00:57]:
Exactly. Exactly. And, like, diabetes is another example. Right? Like, people just think, oh, insulin resistance, you know? Insulin resistance actually happens for several reasons. It could be if you have a low grade infection for a long period of time. You know, your body’s reserves are just being utilized that whole time, right? Or you could have a specific factor that specifically attack the pancreatic cells. So, you know, really looking at, things a little bit more deeper is the right word. Right?

Nick Urban [01:01:22]:
Yeah. And you probably see a low grade infection on blood work, like white blood cell elevations. Right?

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:01:29]:
Standard C reactive protein, you know, I think that isn’t, a one that you can see, but, you know, in the mouth, it’s kinda hard to tell because there’s a range. Right? You’re because everything is inflammation. Right? Everything is inflammation, and the goal isn’t to get rid of inflammation. We need inflammation because it’s also the way our body heals. We just wanna make sure we just want our body to know what’s bad and what’s good inflammation. You know, you work out too much and your body’s, you know, inducing inflammation to build muscle tissue, great, you know? But, you know, you, you know, eat a lot of junk food or whatever it is and your body has to process that. That’s bad.

Nick Urban [01:02:04]:
Yeah. The context always matters and it’s often overlooked sadly.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:02:08]:
Yeah. Context. It’s all about context. Yeah.

Nick Urban [01:02:11]:
And speaking of, I don’t know what your thoughts are on this, but I’ve read that if you’re going to have amalgam, AKA mercury fillings removed, you always wanna go through a biological dentist or someone who specializes in actually removing them because otherwise you can, like, get kidney damage from the mercury exposure.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:02:28]:
Yes. That’s absolutely correct, Dave. Because what happens is when there is, mercury or that’s being removed, it’s actually most toxic toxic when it’s being removed. So that so in order it’s a biological dentist, or it’s it’s by the IOMT. The way that you remove the mercury is you don’t just drill it out. You actually isolate the tooth. There’s extra suction, and you’re also using a binder. We talked about coconut oil as a binder, right, earlier for, we wanna use a binder so that any stored mercury that gets released in from the cells is also found.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:02:59]:
You can use EDTA, you can use chelation, you can use charcoal, you know, so really making sure that, that mercury is removed properly. It’s not just one of the mill and you swallow everything. That’s actually gonna really get you sick. So it’s really important, that mercury is removed safely. And then also not just a dental process, but afterwards, you’re making sure you’re detoxing and making sure it’s being, you know, you’re actually binding the mercury and getting it out.

Nick Urban [01:03:25]:
Yeah. Great. Very important information. Doctor. Nami, if people want to connect with you, to follow your work, how do they find you?

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:03:32]:
Oh, that’s thank you, Nick. That’s so wonderful. So, if you are interested in connecting with me, you can, book a telehealth call through drnannypatel.com or you can go to our demo website. I do practice full time because I just love it. It’s so fun. Teeth are so exciting and fun. It’s, S,FasinSanFrancisco, Green, g r e e n, dentist Com. Please go to our website, check it out, give us a callback.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:03:58]:
We’re happy to help. Also, I have my courses that I’ve designed for patients, especially if you want to understand the oral systemic connection because one would never think acid reflux has anything to do with your mouth, But really learning how acid reflux has a lot to do with your mouth is a really great way to, you know, prevent disease and dysfunction and really making sure that we don’t we’re not stuck on pill, you know, or ADHD or what have you. There’s so many relations between the mouth and the rest of the body, and it really goes in about how things are, related, especially the whole systemic connection.

Nick Urban [01:04:30]:
Interesting. Are there any other connections that are often overlooked that you think are worth really briefly mentioning? You don’t need to go into any detail, but

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:04:37]:
Yeah. ADHD is a really big one. Acid reflux is a really big one. We talked about anxiety already, but ADHD, believe it or not, has to do with also the 10 physician. And also most of those, patients are of d vitamin deficient. So, you combine D deficiency with, B1, B5 deficiencies and then they have a, big large tongue that makes them restless. Right? Because they’re not getting that good sleep. You’re depleting all your acetylcholine.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:05:06]:
So that’s ADHD. And, believe it or not, I have so many patients that we’ve taken off of Vyvanse or any sort of ADHD meds, because we’ve been able to work with their functional structural issues, tongue position, as well as, you know, vitamins and things like that. And then, people who have a CPAP. Right? Acid reflux is very common. We used to think that it’s just because of spicy foods or, like, hey. I had too much caffeine. Yes. Those are some causes, but majority of the reasons our patients are getting, you know, acid reflux is actually the tongue falls back and creates a lot of pressure.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:05:42]:
So your lower esophageal sphincter actually actually opens up and you get, you know, acid that comes into the mouth because it’s basically the tongue falls too far back.

Nick Urban [01:05:52]:
Nice. I have some new connections to look into.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:05:55]:
Yeah.

Nick Urban [01:05:56]:
If there was a burning of the books and all knowledge on earth is lost, you get to save the works of three teachers. Who would you choose and why?

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:06:04]:
Wow. That’s actually a really, really, really interesting question. Choose a work of three teachers. Well, of course, I mean, I love Western Price. I feel like that in my world is, like amazing. The other two I would say is Bale Donine. They’re great as a dentist and a cardiologist who really work together on preventing heart attacks. So I feel like they’re great authors.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:06:26]:
And then Doctor. Bredesen, for preventing Alzheimer’s. I thought, and I really like him because he’s talking about the KetoFlex, diet. That’s really great. The KetoFlex diet, because people talk about Keto all the time, but actually for optimum performance, KetoFlex is really great because you it actually lowers inflammation. And he does the recommendation is twelve hours of intermittent fasting, three hours before bed. But the KetoFlex, it really makes a massive difference because, our bodies are amazing machines and we can really, really, really biohack it really well.

Nick Urban [01:07:00]:
Beautiful. Any final parting advice or things you wanna leave listeners with today?

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:07:07]:
I would just say, how can I be of service if you’ve got a question, a problem answer? So, you know, let me, you know, be, of service to you. If there’s anything I can help with, same to you, Nick. You know, delighted to connect with you today and really love the work you’ve done. I’ve really enjoyed listening to your podcast and really seeing, you know, what I really liked about, you know, when I was going through your podcast and stuff is it wasn’t just basic stuff. You really dive in, and I really appreciate that as as you put your teeth into it. How about that?

Nick Urban [01:07:36]:
And my tongue into it as well.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:07:38]:
Exactly. Exactly.

Nick Urban [01:07:40]:
Doctor Naomi, this has been a blast. We covered a lot of ground today. I’m sure I’m gonna go back and listen to this and have some new takeaways and things that I’m gonna try and implement, including the tongue exercise party on Friday nights. But thank you so much for joining me in the podcast today.

Dr. Namrata Patel [01:07:55]:
My pleasure.

Nick Urban [01:07:56]:
Thank you for tuning in to this episode. Head over to Apple Music, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts and leave a rating. Every review helps me bring you thought provoking guests. As always, you can find the show notes for this one at mindbodypeak.comslash, and then the number of the episode. There, you can also chat with other peak performers or connect with me directly. The information depicted in this podcast is for information purposes only. Please consult your primary health care professional before making any lifestyle changes.