Everyone’s talking about gut health, but have you ever considered that your mouth is the doorway to your gut? If you’ve been dealing with chronic health issues that just don’t seem to budge, we think it’s time to look at how your mouth could be playing a role. Did you know that issues like cardiovascular disease, autoimmune diseases and leaky gut all have direct links to the health of your mouth? Or that your teeth, dental arch and the shape of your jaw are all a reflection of your overall wellbeing? It turns out that your oral health is having a way bigger impact than you may realise, and there’s plenty you can do to support it.
Weston A Price: The Dentist Who Changed The Nutrition World
Way back in the 1920s and 30s, a dentist named Weston A Price travelled the world researching isolated communities including Swiss villages, a Scottish island, Eskimo and North American Indian groups, South Sea islanders, Australian Aborigines, Maori communities, and Peruvian, Amazonian, and African tribespeople. He wanted to know what they were eating and how this affected their health. Rather than starting from disease though, he deliberately studied healthy people to understand how they achieved that health.
He found that people who were still living in their traditional communities and consuming their traditional diets had well-formed dental arches, minimal tooth decay, and strong resistance to diseases, despite not brushing, flossing or paying any particular attention to their oral health. As soon as the younger members of these communities came into contact with industrial societies and modern foods like refined sugar and flour however, tooth decay and other health issues ran rampant. This fuelled the understanding that the health of your mouth - and your entire body - isn’t just about which toothpaste you use, it’s about what you eat.
When people left behind their nutrient-dense diets in favour of what is considered ‘normal’ today, they also left behind the nutrients that were keeping them strong and vital. Price conducted many experiments, and he found the difference in nutrient-density between traditional and modern foods to be huge:
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4x more water-soluble vitamins like vitamin C and B vitamin, calcium, and other minerals in traditional diets vs. the average American diet of his day
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10x more fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K), mostly from animal foods like butter, organ meats, shellfish, fish eggs, and eggs
“Modern commerce has deliberately robbed some of nature’s foods of much of their body-building material… In the production of refined white flour approximately eighty per cent of the phosphorus and calcium content are usually removed, together with the vitamins and minerals provided in the embryo or germ.” - Weston A Price. Nutrition and Physical Degeneration
Same family, different nutrition. The teeth tell the story.
How Your Mouth Mirrors Your Health
Just as Weston A Price showed us that a healthy mouth most often represents a healthy, resilient body, the development of your jaw, teeth and facial structure determines so much of your health too. Your mouth is already shaping your health before you’re even born. In the womb, jaw and teeth development begins at around 6 weeks gestation, and the health of these structures is largely dependent upon the mother’s intake of nutrients like calcium, phosphorus, vitamin D, vitamin C, and protein. Maternal stress can also expose the developing fetus to hormones like cortisol, which alter bone development and increase the risk of dental issues, and can cause teeth to erupt earlier than usual too.
When a baby is born, the first few years of life can significantly influence oral health. Breastfeeding requires and builds significantly more jaw strength than bottle feeding, and if breastfeeding, a mother’s diet can help provide baby with vital nutrients for bone and tooth development too. For more on postnatal nutrition, we have a new blog coming out next week (stay tuned). If a baby doesn’t breastfeed, they can still develop strength with techniques like gum massage and oral motor exercises, which you’ll find here. As they grow, consuming real, whole foods is another important way to support jaw development and strength. This doesn’t mean you have to serve your toddler a tomahawk steak - it could look like chewing on slow cooked beef or chicken, carrot sticks, sourdough crusts, or even bones with a little meat still attached.
Reversing Health Issues With Nutrient-Dense Foods
For children who are already more developed but dealing with oral issues, we can look again to the research of Weston A Price. Price tested his nutritional ideas directly on malnourished Depression-era mill workers' children with rampant tooth decay. He replaced part of their sugar-and-white-flour diet with one nutrient-dense school meal a day; organ meats, bone-in stews, fresh milk, and butter, plus a daily dose of high-vitamin cod liver oil and butter oil. Tracked by X-ray, the results were dramatic: existing cavities stopped progressing and began to remineralise, no new decay formed, and the children's energy and schoolwork improved too. He later repeated this with malnourished orphans on a similar nutrient-dense, sugar-free diet, with the same outcome. Decay arrested and reversed. For Price, this was a revolution; it wasn't genetics or luck protecting traditional populations' teeth, it was the food itself, and restoring that nutrient density could undo damage that had already been done.
Oral Health and Overall Health: The Diseases Linked To Your Mouth
You might be shocked to know, but many chronic diseases are directly linked to the mouth. Just as your gut contains a microbiome, your mouth does too. When the microbiome of the mouth becomes disrupted - known as oral dysbiosis - the bacteria can impact other parts of the body. When you swallow, these bacteria enter your stomach and intestines, disrupting the natural balance of your gut microbiome.
A large number of studies show that bad bacteria from the mouth can promote the development of cardiovascular disease, autoimmunity and obesity all have strong links to gum disease. Inflammation of the mouth, metal fillings and a disrupted oral microbiome can also contribute to type 2 diabetes, allergies, depression, cognitive decline, fertility issues, and leaky gut by fuelling body-wide inflammation and the spread of damaging bacteria. This is why, if you feel like you’ve been trying endlessly to fix your gut, you might be looking in the wrong place. It’s not all bad though; if we know that problems in the mouth can contribute to disease, then it follows that a healthy mouth can prevent and maybe even reverse problems. This is where nutrition can play a vital role.
Top 10 Essential Nutrients For Your Mouth
Weston A Price found that the people with the healthiest mouths and healthiest bodies were eating their original traditional diets. These diets all looked slightly different depending upon their location, but they had something important in common; they all prioritised nutrient-dense animal foods. Combining this ancestral wisdom with the science of modern biological dentistry, we now know some of the vital nutrients we need to support strong teeth and oral health:
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Vitamin D3: Regulates your body's ability to absorb calcium and phosphorus, which are the vital building blocks of your enamel and jawbone.
Best sources: Sunlight, sardines, salmon, beef liver -
Magnesium: Regulates calcium absorption, strengthens tooth enamel, supports jawbone density, and helps prevent gum inflammation
Best sources: Cacao, dark leafy greens, pumpkin seeds -
Zinc: Naturally present in your saliva, dental plaque, and enamel, zinc supports your oral microbiome by preventing harmful bacteria from building up and causing damage.
Best sources: Oysters, grass-fed beef, chicken, pumpkin seeds -
Vitamin C: Aids collagen synthesis for strong gums and lowers inflammation
Best sources: Citrus fruits, peppers, kiwi, broccoli -
Vitamin K2: Directs calcium exactly where it needs to go - into your bones and teeth - and keeps it out of your soft tissues
Best sources: Grass-fed butter, egg yolks, parmesan -
Calcium: Builds and strengthens tooth enamel, supports jawbone density, and allows your saliva to repair early tooth decay
Best sources: Grass-fed dairy, colostrum, sardines (with bones) -
Phosphorus: Works hand-in-hand with calcium to build, protect, and repair your teeth. Primarily responsible for maintaining the strength and integrity of your tooth enamel
Best sources: Tuna, grass-fed dairy, chicken, liver -
Vitamin A: Promotes saliva production, supports the formation of tooth enamel, and maintains healthy mucous membranes in the gums
Best sources: Beef liver, egg yolks, grass-fed dairy -
B-complex vitamins: Help reduce gum inflammation, support tissue repair, prevent painful mouth sores, and maintain the integrity of the mucous membranes in your mouth
Best sources: Beef organs, grass-fed beef, oysters, eggs -
Omega 3s: Reduce inflammation, support jaw bone strength and reduce bad bacteria
Best sources: Beef brain, sardines, salmon, flax, chia seeds
Action Steps: Natural Support For Oral Health
Let’s be real; we live in the modern world, and we’re not saying you don’t need to brush your teeth… What we are saying is that the health of your mouth could be having a bigger impact on your overall health than you realise, and that small shift to your diet and lifestyle can make a big difference. Here’s how we’re supporting the health of our mouths and beyond:
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A nutrient-dense diet including organ meats, bone broth, grass-fed dairy, seafood and oily fish. These are some of the most nutrient-dense foods on the planet.
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Avoiding refined sugar and flour
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Keeping healthy calcium-to-phosphorus ratios: Approximately 99% of your body's calcium and 85% of its phosphorus are stored in your bones and teeth. Maintaining a healthy calcium-to-phosphorus ratio directly supports your teeth by ensuring your body has the exact building blocks required to build, repair, and protect tooth enamel. Our Whole Bone Matrix supplement provides calcium and phosphorus in the correct ratio of 2:1 to care for teeth and bones
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Mouth taping at night: Many people breathe through their mouths whilst sleeping, which can contribute to poor oral health and tiredness the next morning. By using a tiny piece of micropore tape, you can encourage your mouth to stay closed. Nasal breathing = a healthier mouth, better sleep and a healthier overall body. (Never use mouth tape on babies or young children).
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Supplementing with mineral-rich celtic oysters, beef liver and colostrum.
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Oil pulling: A long-standing traditional oral self-care practice, oil pulling can help reduce harmful oral bacteria, decrease plaque buildup, and alleviate gingivitis. Coconut oil is our favourite.
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Using a healthier fluoride-free toothpaste like Kingfisher, Georganics or Boka
It's not about having the perfect diet or the best oral health routine, but about focusing on what's doable for you right now. Could you include a few more nutrient dense foods per week, supplement with oysters, or choose an alternative toothpaste? Small steps make sustainable change.
The APE Team