By: Rebecca Harper
I’ll be the first to admit that I spend far too much time on Pinterest. The online image sharing platform is very popular with creative types and those looking for advice on anything from cleaning the fridge to planning vacations. Another popular section of the website is the DIY health and beauty section, dishing out advice on anything from how to cure a common cold to recipes for at-home hair masks. While putting a concoction of eggs and vinegar in your hair might be completely harmless, there are some trends that are altogether more dangerous and could have lasting impact on a person’s health. Dental care and teeth whitening is one area that people need to be very careful about the advice that they follow. Here are just a few of the dangerous trends circulating Pinterest…
Teeth Whitening with Strawberries
With professional teeth whitening costing upwards of £200, it’s no wonder that people are going in search of a free alternative. This popular method involves mashing up a few strawberries and brushing your teeth with the sweet paste. After rinsing your mouth, you then follow with a paste of bicarbonate of soda and water. The before and after pictures look promising, but this is a really dangerous method of whitening your teeth. The acids and small seeds in the strawberries effectively strip your teeth of enamel and then the abrasive bicarb whitens the exposed dentin below. Doing this repeatedly will certainly lead to cavities and tooth loss. Unless you want to be getting dental implants by the age of 30, then this method should be avoided!
Oil Pulling
Oil pulling is a way of cleaning your teeth by swishing and pulling oil through your teeth for around 10-15 minutes, although some people will swear by doing this for upwards of 30 minutes a day. Oil pulling is an Indian Ayurveda practice that dates back between 3,000 and 5,000 years. It has gained popularity in recent years due to the association of “pulling” toxins from your body. If you swish anything around your mouth for a long time, it will undoubtedly clean your teeth as the swishing action will dislodge particles in your mouth. However, there is the danger that you might accidentally swallow or inhale the oil. It’s possible you can develop a condition called lipid pneumonia which occurs when you are close to aerosolized oils. Young children are particularly at risk of choking when oil pulling so it’s really important not to encourage children to do this practice.
DIY Braces
It’s hard to believe, but some people are actually trying to save money by doing their own orthodontics. There’s a reason your orthodontist went to school for 7+ years and some people are losing teeth or undergoing painful surgery as a result of this disastrous trend. The most popular method of DIY orthodontics is to use the elastics used to fix jaw alignments to move the teeth. By slipping the elastics around teeth, it is thought that you can change the alignment. The result is often tooth loss or painful surgery to remove elastics that have become stuck in the gums. If you want to fix your teeth, it’s always best to leave this to the professionals.
