Brushing your teeth twice daily and flossing regularly is essential for oral hygiene, but what about your tongue health?
Tongues can harbour bacteria and accumulate dead skin cells and food debris. If you haven't considered cleaning your tongue, it's time to start!
Tongue scrapers are an effective tool to remove bacteria, food and plaque from its surface. The ancient Ayurvedic therapy of tongue scraping can help remove bacteria and fungi, improve bad breath and increase your oral health.
Here are 5 reasons to use a tongue scraper today!
- Tongue scraping removes bacteria in the mouth that's associated with bad breath, gum infections and dental decay.
- Got bad breath? By removing bacteria, fungi, dead skin cells and food debris, you can improve the odour of your breath.
- Using a tongue scraper can help enhance your ability to taste. Twice daily scraping may help you better distinguish between sweet, salty, bitter and sour flavours.
- Tongue scraping may assist your body's detoxification ability by keeping it clean and removing any toxic buildup.
- Daily tongue scraping will help you build a better relationship with your tongue! The coating, shape and general appearance of your tongue can indicate how healthy you are including the health of your gastrointestinal system, liver function and level of hydration.
How to use your tongue scraper
Tongue scraping is relatively easy to do, and the process takes less than two minutes. And all you need is a tongue scraper.
We recommend a copper tongue scraper, like this one from The Sustainable Life, for its anti-bacterial, anti-microbial properties.
Here is a step by step on how to use your tongue scraper:
- Stick out your tongue and gentle position the rounded u-end of the scraper at the back of your tongue (if gagging is a problem, start in the middle and then gradually move further back as you get used to it.
- Slowly pull the scraper along the surfaces of your tongue until you reach the tip. Always move from back to tip, not the other way around.
- After each scrape, wipe with a cloth to remove any debris.
- Repeat 2-3 times until you have scraped the entire surface well.
- Wash the tongue scraper well after use.
Repeat as necessary. Most recommendations are for twice-daily scraping.