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Child: Welcome to my Mommy’s podcast.
Katie: Hello, and welcome to The Wellness Mama Podcast. I’m Katie from wellnessmama.com, and I am back today with Dr. Griffin Cole to tackle the connection between oral bacteria and disease and the health of your mouth relating to the health of your entire body. And he is quite the expert in all areas dentistry. He practiced as a dentist for almost three decades, has extensive continuing education and deep research, and has actually helped write the papers and the reviews of some of the topics we’re going to talk about, including fluoride, which we talked about in our first episode. But I really wanted to go deep in this episode with him on the connection of the oral microbiome to the entire body and how disease in the mouth can translate other places as well. So, he covers that topic in depth, as well as we go into ways to support the oral microbiome from the inside out, whether oil pulling is effective, what to do if you get cavities, his take on root canals, understanding ozone therapy, what a biological dentist is and how to find one, and so much more. He also, at the end of this episode, shares direct contact information to him as well as the invitation to reach out to him if you need a second opinion on a dental issue, which is a tremendous gift and resource for you guys to have. I link to many of the resources he mentioned in the show notes at wellnessmama.com. I hope that you learn as much from this episode as I did. Let’s join Dr. Cole. Dr. Griffin, welcome back.
Dr. Cole: Thanks for having me again.
Katie: Such an honor to get to talk to you again. In our first episode, I’ll link in the show notes, we got to tackle the controversial topic of fluoride and why I have avoided it for many years, why you encourage your patients to avoid it as well. And I want to build on that conversation today in this episode and really go deep on understanding the connection of the oral microbiome to the entire body and through that its role in disease. And we’ll get to get really nuanced into some specific subtopics of that. But to bring this conversation in, will you kind of give us an overview for people who don’t already understand the really intricate relationship between oral health and the whole body? Because we can often think of our mouth as an isolated part of our system. But I was amazed when I started to really understand how much incredible communication is happening between the oral microbiome, between the mouth and the entire body.
Dr. Cole: Yeah, so essentially our body is full of microbes, as I mentioned. We’re about 90% microbes. So bacteria, fungi, viruses, parasites, you name it. And we’ve got anaerobes, which are ones that don’t need oxygen to live. Those are sometimes called the bad bacteria, if you will, the obligate anaerobes. And then we’ve got aerobes, aerobic bacteria, which do need oxygen to live. And when you talk about the mouth, and I’ll just say this, and this is not an exaggerated statement at all but we have over 500 species of bacteria in our mouth alone. And when you look at the heart, let’s say, and heart disease, when they actually do an assay of the arteries to see what is in this plaque buildup, it is predominantly, and when I say predominantly, I mean over 90% oral bacteria. So things like P. gingivalis, gingivalis, that word alone with gingivitis in our gums, Fusobacterium nucleotide, F. nucleotide is the most predominant bacteria in our mouth. And that is found in high numbers in all organs when they actually assay them or do autopsies.
So this is all one thing here, Katie. It’s not a separate thing, you know, you say that and it’s not a funny statement because I would say most dentists act that way. I remember early on when I was doing some, I was asking patients about their diets and I was even doing blood chemistries. I mean, we’re talking the late 90s and several dentists were teasing me saying, why are you even asking that? What does that matter? And I looked at them, I go I shouldn’t ask them about their diet or know what their blood chemistry is like? And they’re like, that’s stupid. This is, you just work on the mouth. And that’s kind of the sentiment, unfortunately, that’s still going on in mainstream dentistry, certainly not in biologic dentistry, which is why I highly recommend that, you know, that all your listeners, anybody out there seeks a biologic dentist and do your due diligence. I mean, interview many to find one that you work well with.
But we have to understand that this is not one separate entity. This is all connected. And biologic dentists in particular, I think, are the most important practitioners on this topic because we have the time to sit down and actually have a discussion with you and find out things like your diet, your health history, your parents’ oral history. You know, what medications are you taking? What supplements are you taking? Do you drink raw milk? I mean, we can go into detail about all kinds of things that most dentists either don’t have the time or the inclination to even ask. And so this microbiome is throughout our entire of our body. It’s not about killing Katie. It’s not about let’s get in there and kill everything. It’s more about how do we make things alkaline in the mouth and make things make all the bacteria come in so very happy. And that’s how we control things like decay and gum disease.
Katie: Yeah, that makes sense. And I know that maybe people have heard of this, but if someone has like a heart condition, for instance, because of the connection of the oral microbiome to the whole body, often those people are recommended to take antibiotics when they have dental work because it can actually cause an infection. And so we acknowledge this, I feel like in some subsets of the population, but we don’t then lean into that and understand how we can create a positive feedback loop if we understand how connected the mouth is to the rest of the body.
You mentioned biological dentistry. I feel like this is not widespread yet. It’s hard to find sometimes a biological dentist. Can you go a little deeper on what separates a biological dentist from traditional dentistry and how a person can know if the dentist they’re trying to work with understands biological dentistry and is able to do that?
Dr. Cole: Yeah, that’s a great question. So if I can just make it real simple, in traditional dentistry, it’s pretty much you’ve got a cavity, I fill it. You’ve got a pain. I try to get rid of the pain. You’ve got an infection. I give you antibiotic. So it’s very much like Western medicine. It’s symptom relief. What’s your symptom? Here’s what I’m gonna do for you.
Biologic dentistry is more like functional medicine in that we’re going to actually try to figure out what is causing these issues. Why are you getting decay? Why do you have gum disease? You know, why are you cracking teeth? These are things that a biologic dentist will take the time to delve into and do a very thorough evaluation. And listen, not all biologic dentists are great dentists either. So that’s why I say do your due diligence and really, really do a deep dive into first doing research on the dentist, but also maybe getting other opinions as well until you find an office that feels right to you. But a biologic dentist is going to look at everything. I mean, obviously, we’re still dentists. We’re still going to fix things. If you’ve got a broken tooth, it’s got to be fixed. You’ve got a cavity, it’s got to be filled. But we’re going to find out the focus. Why are you having these problems occur? And that’s really what you want, more whole-body care.
Katie: Yeah, I love it. The idea of root cause dentistry and almost like functional medicine doctors of the mouth. I am hopeful that we’ll start to see that a lot more available in a lot of areas because I know in a lot of places it’s still really tough to find. But I feel like building on the tenets, the understanding that biological dentists have, we can all learn more about how to support our mouths, not just in what we do as part of our oral care routine, but even from the inside out.
And I know when I first started learning about this, you mentioned the different bacteria that can be present in the mouth and the idea of not wanting to just wipe out bacteria, just like we wouldn’t want to just take antibiotics every day and destroy our gut bacteria, but learning how to support actually the oral microbiome because it knows how to maintain a good balance that’s healthy for us if it gets the right support. And I thought it was interesting to learn, for instance, there’s things like, I believe it’s strep mutans that leads to cavities and then there’s the gingivitis bacteria, but they don’t often, from my understanding, exist at the same time because they’re actually sort of competitive bacteria. And in understanding that, I realized like, oh, there’s a whole world of microbiome and how do I support the beneficial bacteria in the mouth so that they can do the role properly? Are there any things on the list of sort of to avoid substances that we might eat or use in our mouth that can harm our oral microbiome? And or are there any things we can use that support the proper functioning of the oral microbiome?
Dr. Cole: Yeah, it’s going to sound a bit hackneyed, but sugar. I mean, I, you know, especially refined sugars. I mean, if you, you know, I still think you can eat fruit that’s organic. You can eat that all morning if you like, and you’ll be fine. But it’s the refined sugars that are the ones that, see, when you get a cavity, it’s the acids that are produced by the bacteria. And they only produce those acids when they come in contact with things they like, like sugar. So if you can have, as I mentioned earlier, a very alkaline diet, you know, getting plenty of protein and good fats and maybe keeping the carbs a bit low, that’s going to support really the entire microbiome.
Beyond that, hydrating with water, getting plenty of water each day, and using a toothpaste like Wellnesse with hydroxyapatite. You want to give your teeth an environment as well that feels right. And again, that naturally occurring crystalline structure will integrate in the enamel to not only strengthen it, but to also keep all the bacteria happy at that point in time. Pretty simple stuff, really.
Katie: Simple but profound. And you mentioned healthy fats. I feel like this is something we started to understand in the role of the human diet for supporting other parts of the bodies. And we realized the hard way that completely avoiding fat actually isn’t great for our brains or our bodies. But I was so interested when I learned about the role of fats in the mouth, because you wouldn’t think like, you know, hard teeth full of calcium, eat calcium. You don’t think about fat-soluble vitamins.
But I was so interested when I learned like our saliva also is sort of like living organism that’s communicating with what’s happening inside the teeth and the whole remineralization process. But how we need certain fat-soluble vitamins to be present for that to happen optimally. And a lot of us aren’t actually getting enough of that in the modern diet because it’s harder to find those fat-soluble vitamins in the modern diet. Are there any dietary habits that from the nutrient perspective, obviously avoiding sugar, I feel like every dentist hopefully agrees with that recommendation. But are there things we could do from a supportive standpoint to make sure we’re actually hitting some of those nutrient and micronutrient categories that we may be missing in our diet?
Dr. Cole: Yeah, so you’re talking mostly about A, D E, and K. Those are the fat-soluble vitamins, and they’re all critical. And you’re right. If you were to go and do a PubMed search today and look up cancers, you’re going to find that most of those cancer sufferers are low in those fat-soluble vitamins as well as B-complex too. But I don’t think people realize that we can’t always get that. We definitely can’t get that from most of the mainstream foods that you’ll find between the end aisles, right? I mean, any kind of packaged foods and things, you’re not going to find these important fat-soluble vitamins.
o this all gets back to diet again, Katie. I mean, eating some good, clean flesh as far as, you know, organically raised, humanely raised, no hormones and pesticides, you know, green leafy vegetables. Vegetables are really great, as you learned, I know, from Weston Price, just to sort of go through and wash things through the body. It’s not necessarily that we’re eating them and our stomach is breaking them down and getting nutrients. That’s not what they’re for. We don’t really get any benefit from those until they get into our intestines. But we do get benefits. Whereas eating clean flesh and all that actually is broken down in the stomach and we get quite a bit of nutrients and a lot of those fat-soluble vitamins. Now, obviously, there’s some things like olive oil and coconut oil and other and avocado oil and avocados just in general, where you get some good fats in your body. So yeah, it’s critical, you know, the ketogenic diet was probably the closest thing to how we should eat. But honestly, you can’t exist on that long term either. You know, kind of a primitive diet like Weston Price promotes, I think is the way to go. And it’s a lot of common sense too.
Katie: Agreed. And I know I’ll say, and you can feel free to disagree with me on this, but I also feel like we have sort of like a light deficiency in the modern world and that we know obviously getting the right amount, not burning, but the right amount of sunlight is one of the ways that we get vitamin D into our bodies. And I wonder if our sort of widespread avoidance of the sun and overuse of sunscreen is creating a negative effect in the mouth because we’re simply not getting enough sun. So that’s something that I prioritize in my health routine is getting the right amount of sunshine daily, not just for the vitamin D, for the whole cascade of benefits of the spectrum of light. But I just feel like that’s a thing we’ve overlooked that can be really harmful.
Dr. Cole: Yeah, I used to tell patients for years, go out and get at least 20 minutes of sunlight. Don’t put anything on your body. No, no sunscreen. And go out there and just bathe in this incredible energy source. And you’re right with the sun. Like, I don’t use sunblock at all anymore. I really feel like if you really do a deep dive into this, I think that is more the cause of skin cancers than the sun itself is all the chemicals that are in the sunscreens. And so Hippocrates, which was arguably the first physician, used to have people that would line up for miles to see him. And he would say, before I see any patients, I want you to do two things. I want you to sunbathe. And clean your colon. And once you do that, then if you still need me, come see me. And of course, over half the line would be gone and come back.
Katie: I love that. I’m curious your take on oil pulling, because this is something I have done on and off for a while. And I’m curious if you think it’s a good idea. And if so, if you have any tips for the right oils to choose or method of doing that.
Dr. Cole: Yeah, I don’t think it’s necessary, but I experienced it with a lot of patients, and I tried it myself. And as you know, Katie, when it first came out, it was you know, just olive oil, and it was 20 minutes in the mouth, you walk around, and that was just way too long. So if somebody wants to, it does strip the biofilm off real nicely. That’s the plaque that forms on the teeth and some of the gums. If you want to do a quick five-to-10-minute oil-pulling session, that will help. I definitely saw improvement in a lot of people’s gums and teeth when they did that. It’s not necessary, as I mentioned, with everything we’ve talked about thus far, but I think it’s a fine thing.
Katie: Awesome. I appreciate your perspective on that. And I would love to use our remaining time to also get to go deep on another big topic in the dental world. And one that I feel like people maybe don’t realize there are more options than they think, which is the topic of cavities or at the extreme root canals. I’ve not ever had a root canal, but I have in my research have decided if that were ever a thing that I was told I needed, I think I’d rather have the tooth pulled, which I know is a strong statement than get a root canal. But I would love for you to give your perspective on that. Maybe that extreme of a mindset is not actually good in the way I look at it, but I would love for you to explain because I would guess most people don’t question when they are told by a dentist that they need to have a cavity filled or need to have a root canal.
Dr. Cole: Yeah, I love how you asked that, Katie, because I’m the same way. Like I try not to make a bold statement either way. I will say this, obviously, after 30 years of practicing biologic dentistry, root canals are an imperfect treatment, just so everybody understands that from the get-go. It is not a perfect treatment. You cannot get 100% of all the microbes out of the tooth once it’s died. And that’s what a root canal is, is you’re trying to basically roto root out the inside of the tooth because it’s now been invaded by bacteria.
But that being said, I think there are exceptions to the rules. I’m with you. If I had a tooth that had a longstanding infection or whatever, and I had the choice between a root canal or pulling it, I think the best choice long-term is to remove the tooth. You’re getting rid of any possibility of this being a focus of an issue down the road.
Now, what about a 10-year-old kid, though, who bangs his tooth in the front? Trauma. And there’s no infection, but the tooth has been traumatized. That’s a different issue now. Now I think I would do a root canal. However, I would incorporate ozone therapy. Ozone is the sort of magic ingredient that will penetrate through all those tubules inside of a tooth and kill everything.
So if you’re going to do it, there is a way to do it that’s more biologically sound. I let the patient make that choice. If a person, I’ll try to make it easy for your listeners. If a person has a cancer or history of cancer, probably not a wise move to do a root canal. If you have an autoimmune disease or you’re auto, you know, immune compromised in any way, probably not the best choice. But have a long discussion with your dentist and you make that choice. No dentist should tell a patient which way to go on that. You know, I don’t put my confirmation bias on anybody and nobody else should. But get informed. There’s a lot of information on this. If you go online right now, most of it’s bad against root canals. A lot of it’s accurate. But there’s also some, you know, there are people in my niche that are just against root canals across the board and they want no discussion of it at all. And I don’t think that’s the way to be either.
Katie: I appreciate you bringing balance to that discussion. I hadn’t considered, you know, if a child damages the tooth, that could be a different instance entirely. But important to be aware of those cautions, you said, especially the contraindications. I wonder if those are not well talked about or people just being aware that there could be a continued thing to watch out for, to be aware that there was bacteria there and just to keep an eye on it.
What about on a smaller scale, things like cavities? I know I, so for backstory, I had several cavities at one point when I was pregnant and I decided not to do anything about them while I was pregnant because pregnancy is another time when being cautious about dental work and we moved while I was pregnant. And so I was at a different place with a new dentist after pregnancy. And I went back to, or went to this new dentist thinking I need to figure out this cavity thing. And they did X-rays, and I didn’t have any cavities. And these were very small cavities to begin with. But I first wondered, like, did they miss it on the X-rays? But then wondered, like, is it possible that small cavities can actually go away? Does our body know how to fix those? And I know that also is a controversial statement. And I would love your perspective on that. And if that is true, I know the things I did that seemingly made those cavities go away. Are those good things to do in general to help avoid cavities in the first place?
Dr. Cole: Yeah, you make a very valid point. In fact, this was first pointed out by Weston Price again, way back in the 30s. And that if somebody, let’s just do the obvious. Somebody has a poor diet. And so they’re eating sugar or whatever. They’re not caring for their mouth very well. And they get cavities. If that person all of a sudden decides, I’m going to change the way I eat and the way I care for my teeth, cavities can arrest. It’s called arrested decay. And we see it all the time. You can even see a deep cavity sometimes on an X-ray that can arrest and stop. And your internal dentin, which is below the enamel, can form almost like walls of protection. So you absolutely can arrest decay.
Particularly for moms out there with young children, if you have a child that goes to your pediatric dentist and this dentist says, hey, look at all these cavities that are on the X-rays. I would say to you as the parent, be sure to look at it carefully because if those cavities are still in the enamel, and on an X-ray, it’s very easy to tell, okay, the enamel is sort of the white outer layer, and then the dentin is the more gray internal layer. If that cavity is not into that dentin unit, you got a chance to stop this. And I mean, simply with either, again, diet correction, or if they’re like, I’m eating a great diet, I’m doing well, I don’t know what else to do. This is again, where ozone therapy, ozone gas injected between the teeth can actually arrest that decay. So it can stop for sure.
Katie: Awesome to have a dentist perspective on that. And it seems like all of the foundational ideas you gave us probably apply here as well of really focused on your diet, making sure your mouth is alkaline, making sure you’re getting enough nutrients, try to keep the oral microbiome supported, probably also deal with stress because I know that can increase acidity in the mouth. And those same things would apply to our children. And so I love that there is hope for that. And I would guess all of those things done preventatively could potentially be even more effective to avoid the problem in the first place.
Dr. Cole: Absolutely. You said a mouthful there. You’re right on.
Katie: Is there anything else in the dental world that people might not think to question that you take a different viewpoint on and that you want to just bring to awareness for the parents listening?
Dr. Cole: Yeah, let me say this. Take ownership of your health. Don’t assume that because we wear a white coat that we know everything. We don’t. Take control of your own health and know this, dentistry is toxic. It just is. I mean, everything, and I’m not talking about the obvious things like mercury fillings, which nobody should have, but even cements, varnishes, composite fillings, everything that we use in dentistry has some bit of toxicity to it. So again, a biologic dentist is going to narrow those down and limit those. I mean, we’re going to do our very best. Obviously, we’re not going to use mercury. We’re not going to use fluoride or nickel or cadmium or arsenic or these things that are used on an everyday basis in pretty much every dental office out there.
So take control of your own health, get informed. We’ve got plenty of information now online that you can find from accurate sources. And be sure that you find any healthcare practitioner, I don’t care if it’s a dentist or a physician or whatever, that will take the time to talk with you and listen. Be quiet for just a few minutes and listen to you because patients are smart. If a doctor is quiet and listens long enough, not only will the patient tell you what’s going on, the actual diagnosis, they’ll actually give you hints on how to treat it. It’s pretty amazing. So take control, everyone.
Katie: That is incredible words to hear from a dentist. I say often in the other context of health, like you are each, we are each our own primary healthcare provider, but I guess also at the end of the day, we are each our own dental provider because we are the ones brushing our teeth, taking care of our oral habits, eating whatever foods we eat that can support our mouth. And I love that that comes from a dentist who does have that authority to tell people to trust their own as well.
Dr. Cole: Yeah, you know how they said four out of five dentists recommend this. I’m the one out of five that actually tells you the truth.
Katie: Oh, I love that. I love that. Are there any resources, you mentioned accurate sources, that you would point people toward if they’re interested in learning more?
Dr. Cole: Yeah, so probably one of the best sources, well, on fluoride, I would go to the Fluoride Action Network, which is fluoridealert.org, O-R-G. Incredible resource for learning everything on the sport case and anything you want to know about fluoride, it’s on that website. They’re an amazing group.
As far as finding a biologic dentist, I would go to a group that I’ve belonged to for over 20 years now, and it’s the International Academy of Oral Medicine and Toxicology. And the website is I-A-O-M-T dot org. And you can actually click on the link. It’ll say patient. You click on that, find a dentist. And we list all 1,500 dentists worldwide. Most are here in North America, but we’ve got quite a few abroad now. We’ve got over 1,500 members. And you can find a dentist that’s close to you. And again, you still want to do your own interview. Make sure that whoever you see has the time to at least have a phone call with you. If they won’t do that, then that may not be the right office. I used to offer a half-hour, no-charge consultation to anybody that wanted to come meet me because I feel like it’s important to see, does this place feel safe? And does it feel like the right place for me? Is this the right doctor for me?
Katie: I love that. And where are you located? I’ll put your links as well in the resources you just mentioned. But if anyone in your local area can find you.
Dr. Cole: So I’ve got so I’ve been so I sold my practice in Austin, Texas, about three years ago. So I’m officially retired. But I just started mentoring and working with the dentist here in northern Colorado and in Berthoud, Colorado. So I’m there for the next year. I’m overseeing everything, meeting with patients with him. So I’m kind of back into the groove again. He’s got an incredible hand.
So if you want to reach out to me directly, there’s a couple ways. You can email me at, it’s my name, it’s griffincole@yahoo.com, G-R-I-F-F-I-N-C-O-L-E at yahoo.com. Or you can text me at 512-293-8782. Either way, I can guide you. If you’re in some other state, you want some information, I’m a good resource for anybody out there.
Katie: Well, that’s amazing. Thank you for sharing direct connection to you. And I love that you’re now mentoring in this space as well. I hope that we see continued change here. Also, anytime I meet someone who questions the common narrative and finds better answers, like sort of ask better questions to get better answers, I’m always curious on the things that helped shape that mindset or the things that were influential to them. So I would love to know what book or number of books have had the most profound impact on you and what they are and why?
Dr. Cole: So, you know, we’ve said this name a few times, but this is not a, this is the absolute truth. One of the very first books I read when I graduated dental school was Nutrition and Physical Degeneration by Weston Price. And I read that because, listen, I was lucky. I happened to join a dentist right out of dental school who at the time was what we would call a biologic dentist. But back then we didn’t call it. We called them mercury-free Dentists. These were dentists who didn’t place mercury fillings. And because of him, once you go down this rabbit hole and you read one thing that guides you in a different direction than what you were taught in dental school, there’s no stopping. You start to realize, oh, my goodness, I didn’t learn really much of anything. I learned how to do dentistry. But I didn’t really learn everything behind it. So that book for me was incredibly powerful because it led me to read so many other books.
And then one other book that I, and this has nothing to do with dentistry really per se, but it’s a book called Mastery by George Leonard. And I love it because it’s an easy read. You can read it on a long flight if you want, but it just talks about how to master whatever you’re doing in your life, whether it’s your profession, your marriage, your life, whatever it is. And I love how he details it and goes through it in such detail because I, you know.
One little story I’ll share with this audience is that the reason why I retired pretty young, by the way, is I injured myself. You know, we dentists are, you know, bent over in such a weird way. And if you’re like me, in that I prided myself on my dentistry, I made sure I saw every line I was creating, every little thing I was touching in my mouth, you have to contort your body in such weird ways that you actually do harm your neck. And I got to a point where I was like, you know what, this isn’t worth it. I’ve already got some damage between some cervical spines here. I think I’m good. I can share my knowledge in other ways. But so, you know, doctor heal thyself. I mean, it was all about, you know, living a true, authentic life. And that’s what I promoted in my practice the whole time. I was always the dentist that would spend time with you and listen and was candid and told you the truth about what’s going on. And I still offer that, as I said, to anybody across the nation that just has a question, you know, just maybe wants to get a second opinion on something. I think it’s important.
Katie: Well, I am deeply grateful for your help with Wellnesse, of course, and also for all that you’ve shared in this episode and in our last episode together. I love this topic and I love that there are voices like you who are helping people have a deeper understanding to ask better questions and to hopefully see continued improvement in their oral health in safe ways. So thank you so much for your time and for everything you’ve shared today.
Dr. Cole: Sure, Katie. Happy to do it.
Katie: And thank you for listening and sharing your most valuable resources, your time, your energy, and your attention with us today. We’re both so grateful that you did. And I hope that you will join me again on the next episode of the Wellness Mama podcast.
If you’re enjoying these interviews, would you please take two minutes to leave a rating or review on iTunes for me? Doing this helps more people to find the podcast, which means even more moms and families could benefit from the information. I really appreciate your time, and thanks as always for listening.
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