Dr. Joseph Lister performed the first antiseptic surgery in 1865, but he may be better known for developing the mouthwash Listerine. Dr. Martin explains why you should switch your mouthwash, and not ditch it.
TRANSCRIPT OF TODAY'S EPISODE
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Dr. Martin: Well, good morning everyone, and once again, welcome to another live this morning. Hope you're having a great start to your day. We got a big announcement coming today, guys. Sun, Steak & Steel, Thursday, it's ready. Okay, a long time coming. We launched that book on Thursday, so we've been looking forward to that and everything's ready to go Thursday. New book, Sun, Steak & Steel. So look for that. Okay, so that'll be Thursday. We're, that book is now ready to go.
Okay, I'm going to ask you a question. Who was Dr. Joseph Lister? L I S T E R. Okay, you probably don't know, but he was the first guy to perform an antiseptic surgery. Medicine, they had to figure out, they had to stop infection. Even today, you know, it's a very difficult thing when you go to the hospital. You got no choice. You got to go to the hospital. You got to go to the hospital. But one thing we know about the hospital, it's the most dangerous place in the world to go. There's bacteria in there that are so resistant to antibiotics. They actually gave them a name. They're called c. difficile. And believe you me, when I tell you how "difficile," how difficult it is to try and fight that. You go to the hospital and your immune system's already compromised. You're unwell, you're going to the hospital, you get surgery or whatever.
But anyway, coming back to the original story, Dr. Joseph Lister in 1865 performed the first antiseptic surgery. But you know what else he developed? He was the first guy to develop mouthwash known as Listerine. Have you ever had Listerine, okay? Or Scope or other ones. I think it was last week, someone asked me, when is Dr. Martin going to do anything on oral health? I said, okay. I'm reading this article on Dr. Lister yesterday. And I said, okay, you know what? Let's talk a little bit about oral help. And I went into some research. And by the way, okay, just by the way, I have been 30, 40 years now telling people don't ditch mouthwash. Switch it. Okay? Don't ditch mouthwash. Switch it. Commercially available mouth washes are dangerous.
See guys, and you know this, but it's worth repeating what we know today about bacteria. There's good, bad, and the ugly. Okay? And again, not only in your gut, there is an invisible war. Every time I read the story of David and Goliath, I love that story in the Bible. You got two armies. You have the Philistines and you have the Israeli army, and they stand there and look at each other every day. They don't do nothing. Okay? And that reminds me of the way your microbiome should be. You got good guys and you got bad guys, and you don't want what they call a dysbiosis. Okay? Dysbiosis is when the friendly army is wiped out or is diminished greatly. Now, we all know about antibiotics in the gut. I've talked to you, I actually posted yesterday about the gut, and autoimmune about the gut and your skin, about the gut and your lungs, about the gut and your brain. We talked about Parkinson's.
The gut is so key because of that microbiome that's there and the two competing forces. And as long as you've got enough good guys, it's called you win. The problem is, in the day and age in which we live, we live in a society that is bug crazy. Okay? What do I mean by that? Well, hey, it kills 99% of all germs. Look at your household products, most people, and it kills 99% of all germs, okay? We're germ phobic. Boy, if you didn't believe that, you go back in through this pandemic, the world closed down for two years, scared skinny of a virus. Guys, you and I, unless you're planning on leaving the planet, you are going to be surrounded by bacteria and viruses. It's not the bacteria and it's not the virus. It's you. It's your immune system. It's the battle. Your body is fully capable of handling any bacteria that comes around any virus. That doesn't mean you'll never get a cold. That doesn't mean you'll never get a flu. But at the end of the day, your immune system, if it's supercharged, it's called you win.
The problem is when you have a phobia, medicine has a phobia for bacteria and viruses. They have a phobia. And look, I get it, you got an antibiotic, they can save your life. But most physicians, not all, most, they don't think of the consequences, the double-edged sword of an antibiotic. They don't think about that. All they think is you got an infection, we got to get rid of it. And some people are put on antibiotics for years and the doctor sleeps at night cause they didn't think they did anything wrong. You don't want that infection to come back. You've got to be on an antibiotic for whatever, but they sleep because they've been duped. There's two parts to it. Okay, you have an infection. I agree. If it's bad, you need an antibiotic. I don't like antivirals because they rarely work. But secondly, they never think of the consequences of those antibiotics.
Guys, I've been writing about this. I've been talking about this for so many years, that it's a double-edged sword. Antibiotics are the greatest discovery of the 20th century. Absolutely. I don't even think it's close, but they wipe out the good guys. They wipe out your bacteria and yeah, you fought an infection. Well, good for you. The problem is down the road when you've wiped out your good bacteria, you get an invasion of the third army. The Trojan horse comes in, it's called yeast or fungus. And Dr. Joseph Lister, the inventor of Listerine again, oh, I know what causes bad breath, it's bacteria, let's get rid of it. Listerine, Scope or whatever. Guys, the problem is you use that and here's what we know orally. It disrupts your microbiome in the mouth. You've got bacteria in the mouth, and yeah, you got some bad guys in there, but as long as you got good guys, they'll take care of the bad guys.
When you take an oral mouthwash, you got problems because now you're disrupting and you get a fungus coming in there. And look, guys, here's some studies. I had these for years. Some of them and some of them are new. One group in your mouth of bacteria. Good guys, you know what they do? They help you to produce nitric oxide. What does that do? Well, nitric oxides, really important. Guys. You know what? When I was in school, I didn't even know what nitric oxide was. We didn't even know it existed. It's a compound in your body. A lot of it's in your mouth. It opens up your blood vessels. Really important for a healthy blood pressure. Really important for your heart. Where the blood vessels relax. Think of nitroglycerin, right? Well, I knew about that in school. They give you a nitroglycerin patch or a spray under your mouth or a pill.
Nitroglycerin, by the way, dynamite. Well, it opens up your blood vessels and what they're finding out with mouthwash, it destroys the nitric oxide in the mouth. Can lead to high blood pressure, can lead to cardiovascular and bacteria. Ask a dentist, there's a huge link between bad bacteria in the mouth and heart disease because it can get into the bloodstream through a root canal or whatever. But the idea with mouthwash is it can destroy the good guys. And like I said, I talked about this years and years and years ago. Don't ditch mouthwash. Switch it like dairy. Don't ditch dairy. Switch dairy. Okay? Don't throw the baby out with the bath water. What is my favorite mouthwash? Someone tell me, yes, probiotics for sure start in the gut. They go everywhere. What can I see? I want you guys to think what's Dr. Martin says. Yes, Sue, you got it. Oregano. Oil of oregano. There's nothing better.
I'll tell you what, because oil of oregano, God's antibiotic, antiviral, antiparasitic, antifungal. Okay? You know what it don't do? And don't kill your good guys. It don't. Oil of oregano kills bad bacteria. Not your good guys. Antibiotics, they kill everything. Your good guys die from friendly fire. You know what I mean by that? You take an antibiotic and it... you know they're shooting and they kill the bad guys. Okay? But they kill your good guys too, that they don't know what the difference is. Oil of oregano kills bad guys, preserves your good guys. That's important. That's why I've been a big fan of oil of oregano for years and years and years and years, okay? I used to test it in my office. There's nothing like oil of oregano. Okay? Brush your teeth with oil of oregano. It's a powerful, powerful antibacterial, but only the bad guys, it preserves your good guys.
Now, mouthwash also, okay, so we've talked about heart disease. Here's another one. Mouthwash and oral cancer. Mouthwash and esophageal cancer connection. Be careful with that. Again, you have to preserve the homeostasis, the balance in your gut, in your mouth. Oral. And a lot of dentists are getting the memo about that now, okay? Hypertension, esophageal cancer, mouth cancer. One of the things that happens if you kill the good guys, it's the invasion of the Trojan horse. And fungus comes out and believe you me, I used to see that all the time orally too. Okay? I thought I'd bring that to you this morning. Okay?
Now let's talk about bones. Okay? I don't know last week, the week before, I can't remember. We put out a newsletter, we put out an email, okay? Do you get our emails? You don't, but you make sure you sign up for our emails. We put a lot of information out there. But I want to talk to you today about bone. Osteoporosis. In North America, we got more osteoporosis than anywhere in the world. And there's a reason for it. There's reasons for it. Okay? I talk about this in my new book. Sun Steak and Steel, coming to a theater on Thursday near you. Okay? Sun, Steak & Steel. I talk about bone quality and again, medicine in general. Bone calcium. Bone calcium, calcium's involved. Okay? So I'm not going to say calcium isn't involved, but they don't realize that just taking calcium that does nothing for your bone. Nothing for your bone.
And today you got a whole generation of medications dedicated to building bone. Problem is they don't work. They don't increase your bone mass, they really don't. And there's legion of side effects. It has been a colossal failure these bone building drugs, you know that they inject into you. Some people take a weekly dose or a monthly dose. And I've been screaming for so long about how silly it is when you're putting a little bit of bone back, but your bones are not any stronger. Okay? The key to bone, okay? More than anything else, but I'm going to list a few things here. The key to healthy bones, the key to healthy bones is muscle. The key to healthy bones is muscle and muscles latch on into bones. Think about it. They have to anchor themselves. I always used to tell my patients, make your anchors strong so that they will hold.
Muscle, guys, and I mentioned this in the book, okay? In Sun, Steak & Steel, steel is S T E E L. Muscle building. Metabolically, there is nothing better for you than making bins for glucose insulin, okay? Nothing better than muscle. So important. In North America, that's a huge issue. We have more osteoporosis than anywhere else in the world because people are crappy eaters. You see, you should be eating your calcium because I'll tell you what, God gave you a supplement. What? Yeah, God gave you a supplement. Calcium with K2, okay? In nature, God gave it to you. Why do you think I talk about eggs, meat, and cheese all the time. They're perfect foods. Perfect. Why? For a lot of reasons. They're all low carb, eggs, meat and cheese, protein, fat, perfect, perfect ratios, cholesterol, hallelujah. You need cholesterol. But when you eat a piece of cheese, when you have dairy, dairy like butter. When you eat a piece of meat, when you eat eggs, what happens? You get calcium surrounded by the vitamin that is needed to transport calcium to where it belongs. Got it? And you even get some vitamin D.
Vitamin D guys is a bouncer. Okay? Calcium. It sees calcium coming. Come here. That's vitamin D. That's why even in medical school, they'll teach you the only reason you need some vitamin D is for your bones. They don't talk about the immune system. They don't talk about anti-inflammatory. They don't talk about vitamin D in the brain. They don't talk about vitamin D for the immune system. They don't talk about that because they don't know it. They got to get me in there teaching. They don't know it. But vitamin D is a bouncer, guys. It says to calcium, come here, come with me. And then, okay, so it allows calcium to get absorbed, okay? Into the bloodstream, okay? But you don't want calcium to stay there. You need the other vitamin. You need k2 because K2 is the traffic cop. It goes, calcium come here. We like you, but it ain't good for you to stay in the bloodstream cause you're going to harden the arteries.
So when they give you a calcium supplement, even if they put vitamin D in it, cause a lot of calcium supplement. Oh, I got vitamin D. Yeah, okay, that's all right. Now you're going to absorb it better. It's going to get into the bloodstream. I'm sorry. You don't want calcium in your bloodstream. You want calcium to go to your bones and teeth, you need k2. It's the traffic cop saying calcium. Just like sugar, right? Do you want sugar in your bloodstream? No, not much. Intsy wintsy teeny weenie. That's a song, isn't it? Polka dot bikini. Oh, that's what it was. Anyway, what vitamin K2 does now, K1. K1 is found in the plant kingdom. Vitamin K2 is found in the animal kingdom. You can't get strong bones when you eat salad. You can't. You need eggs, meat, and cheese because it has vitamin K2. And K2 is the traffic cop that says to calcium, okay, you're in the blood now come here, we're going to put you where you belong.
Okay? That's important. So you need muscle. The stronger your muscle, the stronger the anchor, the stronger the anchor, the stronger the bone. And the other thing is, you know what destroys bone too is high circulating insulin. You see, again, it's food guys. So when you insulin resistance is up, it destroys bone. It glycates. Sugar is very destructive to bones. If you don't believe me, ask your teeth. Ask your teeth. So what did we do? Eat eggs, meat and cheese for strong bones because the delivery mechanism is right built in so that calcium doesn't stay in your bloodstream to harden your arteries. It gets transferred to your bones where it belongs. The traffic cop. Vitamin D is a bone builder, it's a bouncer. So is magnesium. Magnesium's involved in that too, by the way. But you need, at the end of the day, vitamin K2 built right in. That's what I like about it. It's built right in to food.
So when someone tells you to be a vegan, run, run, I think most of them have good motives. I think their motives are alright. I actually think they believe it. I read an article this morning on the pH. I got a headache this morning reading an article on pH. Oh, you can't be acidic. Your body knows how to make you alkaline if you eat the right foods. Anyway, I don't want to scream. Okay, I'm breathing. Okay, I'm breathing. Guys. Friday, question and answer Friday, send your questions in. We love answering your questions. We do. And what's Thursday? Book launch. Sun, Steak & Steel available Thursday. Ready to go. We can't wait. Okay. We can't wait. Okay guys, we love you dearly, and we'll talk to you soon.
Announcer: You've reached the end of another Doctor Is In Podcast, with your hosts, Doctor Martin Junior and Senior. Be sure to catch our next episode and thanks for listening!