All You Need To Know About Teeth Whitening

The desire to have a sparkling white smile is nothing new –  in fact, the ancient Romans used a mixture of goats’ milk and urine to keep their teeth gorgeous! It’s an inevitable fact that as we get older and age, the outer layer of our white tooth enamel starts to become thinner, allowing the yellow-colored dentin beneath to show through, making the teeth appear darker.  Substances which tend to stain the teeth get through the gaps between the tooth enamel crystals and stain the dentin beneath. 

Worst Teeth Stainers

It is commonly said that anything which will stain a white tee shirt, will also stain your teeth. What stains your teeth the worst, though?  We are all very familiar with the obvious culprits such as tea, coffee, red wine and tobacco.

Ironically some constituents of dental preparations such as mouthwashes can also stain your teeth – an example being chlorhexidine and cetylpyridinium chloride. Also some medicines such as the antibiotics minocycline and doxycycline, are associated with tooth staining. With practically everything turning that perfect smile yellow, it's really no wonder that many of us turn to professionals and home-use kits to attempt to restore that former whiteness to our mouths.

Whitening Versus Bleaching

Have you seen the phrases teeth whitening and teeth bleaching thrown around? They are in fact not the same thing, There is a difference between tooth whitening and bleaching and it’s important to understand the difference as it has implications in terms of cost, and potential hazards.

Tooth whitening just restores the teeth to their original color by removing stains and dirt from your teeth, hence special toothpastes can incorporate such whitening ingredients. Tooth bleaching on the other hand, means whitening teeth beyond their natural color, for extra shiny teeth.

Tooth Whitening

All toothpastes contain mild abrasive particles such as aluminium oxide, calcium carbonate or phosphate and silica, which will lift surface stains and help to maintain natural tooth whiteness. So simply regulary brushing your teeth — yes that means twice a day! — is the easiest way to prevent and treat mild staining.

Special whitening toothpastes, however, contain other chemicals or abrasives designed to have more of a whitening effect, such as bicarbonate of soda. But like regular toothpastes they will only remove staining and cannot change the color of your teeth.

DIY tooth whiteners

If you fancy a little harmless tooth whitening at home, private dentist Adina Carrel, DMD, from Manhattan Dental Arts in New York recommends making use of the malic acid contained in strawberries.  

Adina warns not to use this treatment more than once a week, as the acid could damage the teeth if over-used.

Regularly eating crunchy foods like apples, carrots and celery may also help to preserve the whiteness of teeth by stimulating saliva flow, which has a cleaning action.  These foods also act as mild abrasives to ‘scrub’ the teeth clean.  The malic acid in apples might also have a whitening effect.