Health 2025-06-04 22:42:00

Should you brush your teeth before or after breakfast

Brushing your teeth in the morning can help remove bacteria in the mouth, stimulate saliva and protect dental health. However, when to brush your teeth is a problem that many people are confused about. Let's find the answer to this situation with Oralmart in the article below.

What do experts say about the problem of brushing teeth before or after breakfast?

Due to differences in living habits, each person's oral hygiene habits are different. Brushing your teeth after breakfast is considered reasonable, because it cleans plaque and bacteria after meals. Therefore, you can start the day with fresh breath without worrying about food or plaque remaining on your teeth.

However, when you just wake up, your tooth enamel is quite weak because it is not protected by saliva and is attacked by bacteria throughout the night. If you eat food at this time, the tooth enamel will be worn down and weakened by the effects of acids in food. Therefore, brushing your teeth before eating not only helps remove plaque and bacteria on your teeth, but also helps cover the enamel with a protective layer.

According to Healthline - an electronic newspaper that provides quality health information in the US: Brushing your teeth before breakfast is better for your overall oral health, especially tooth enamel. Therefore, you should brush your teeth for at least 2 minutes before breakfast to have fresh and clean breath to start your breakfast more deliciously.

Why do experts recommend brushing your teeth before breakfast?

There are many scientific reasons why brushing your teeth before eating is more beneficial than brushing your teeth after breakfast:

Eliminate bacteria in the oral cavity: While sleeping, the amount of bacteria increases significantly due to decreased salivation, which also leads to nasal breath. Therefore, brush your teeth before eating to remove plaque and other agents that cause bad breath.

Stimulates saliva secretion: Saliva helps wash away food particles and contains cells that fight bacteria and infection, and even provides proteins and minerals to protect teeth from decay. However, the amount of saliva is reduced during sleep, leading to gum and tooth attacks. Therefore, brushing your teeth is like a warm-up move to increase saliva secretion again. This helps remove harmful bacteria in the mouth, while making breakfast more delicious.

Protect tooth enamel: Eating breakfast before brushing your teeth risks causing teeth to be covered with acidic foods, weakening tooth enamel and leading to tooth decay.

Notes on oral hygiene in the morning

In fact, brushing your teeth after breakfast can still be done if you do not want to be uncomfortable with the taste of fluoride in your mouth. However, this can cause acid from food to coat around the weakened enamel and cause enamel erosion.

Therefore, if you want to brush your teeth after breakfast, wait about 30 to 60 minutes for saliva to have time to restore the enamel mineral layer. During this time, using sugar-free gum is a suitable option to clean your teeth.

How to care for a healthy and beautiful smile

Here, Oralmart will introduce you to ways to care for healthy and beautiful teeth.

Maintain a healthy diet

Building a suitable diet is also part of oral health care. Therefore, limit foods such as:

Sweet, carbonated foods: This type of food has a high sugar content and acidity, so it can easily cause oral diseases.

Highly acidic foods: Citrus fruits, bread, etc. can erode tooth enamel.

Foods that are too hot or too cold: Tooth enamel is sensitive to temperature, so this type of food can cause tooth sensitivity.

Implement proper oral hygiene

Brushing your teeth is a simple task, but not everyone knows how to do it correctly. Please refer to the steps below to make brushing your teeth in the morning more effective.

Brush your teeth properly: Use a toothbrush 2-3 times/day to protect your oral health.

Use mouthwash: This is an antiseptic solution that helps increase the effectiveness of cleaning your teeth.

Use a tongue scraper: To remove remaining bacteria, prevent bad breath better.

Use interdental brushes, dental floss, water flossers: Thoroughly clean hard-to-clean areas, avoid tooth decay leading to pulpitis.

Avoid strong impacts that cause damage to teeth.

Check periodically every 6 months.