And this pull toward wellness has seemingly reached the masses. All across the Internet, oil pulling has been said to whiten teeth, strengthen your gums and jaw, prevent gingivitis, rid the body of toxins, improve skin, clear sinuses, promote heart health, and even prevent Alzheimer’s Disease. But is it really worth the hype?
Oil pulling is one part of a daily morning routine in Ayurveda to cleanse the body called dhinacharya. Dhinacharya are these things we do for longevity. If you want longevity, you have a daily routine. It increases a person’s stability and mental focus.
Typically, upon waking up putting cool water on the eyelashes, rinsing the mouth with water, scraping the tongue, brushing the teeth and using the oil. Rinsing, scraping and brushing work together to manually remove bacteria from the mouth so that when you swish with oil, the oil has an ability to reach a little deeper to pull toxicity out and nourish the gums because it’s not stuck on all the other stuff.
But oil pulling is more than just moving oil around in your mouth. Ayurveda mentions two primary techniques—Gandusha and Kabala Graha. In Gandusha, you fill your mouth completely with oil and hold it there for three to five minutes. In Kabala Graha, you use a smaller amount of oil, swish between the teeth, and gargle at the back of the throat.
Oil is antimicrobial and gets into the tissues of the mouth to inhibit bacterial growth. Recent clinical studies have shown that oil pulling does decrease bacterial counts and plaque index in the mouth as well as halitosis (bad breath), similar to chlorhexidine mouthwash. Recently, a small pilot study showed that oil pulling reduced levels of Streptococcus mutans, a strain of bacteria associated with cavities. However, once participants stopped pulling oil, bacterial counts began to increase. It’s also worth noting that these studies included small sample sizes.
It has been seen that when a patient begins pulling oil, their gums no longer bleed and become pinker and healthier. In the longer term, this shows big strides in preventing tartar build-up and halting receding gums. Oil pulling can also effectively clean the mouth if someone has oral ulcerations, which make it painful to brush teeth normally. Much of this makes sense since the oil helps to manually remove bacteria and reduce inflammation. But what about the larger health claims?
We know there’s definitely a link between poor dental health and heart disease, but the connection between oil pulling and the other health benefits is a little fuzzy. Ayurveda recognizes the whole body as one system. Typically you’re not going to have inflammation in the mouth and not elsewhere, whether it’s the brain or the heart.
According to some practitioners, you can map the entire body on the tongue and channels connect the tongue to the rest of the body. So, cleansing and treating the tongue can help to bring other parts of the body into balance.
Additionally, since regularity is paramount to well-being in Ayurveda, simply “implementing dhinacharya can change people’s choices and encourage them to make healthier decisions overall. Once we start to change people’s mindset and bring catabolic changes in the body into check, we can have an effect on inflammation in the body.
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