I’m going to inform you one thing most dentists received’t.
For 40 years, I watched sufferers do all the things proper — brush twice a day, floss, reduce the sugar — and nonetheless lose enamel. Nonetheless grind their enamel at night time. Nonetheless get up exhausted. Nonetheless come again with extra sensitivity, extra recession, extra harm.
However, in lots of instances, the issue wasn’t their toothbrush or floss.
It was a mineral deficiency that just about no one exams for — and that in line with NHANES information, 48% of American adults have proper now with out understanding it.
Magnesium.
I do know. You’ve most likely heard of it. You would possibly even already take it.
However what I’m about to share modified the way in which I apply dentistry, and it would change the way in which you consider your enamel, your sleep, and your mind.
Your enamel could not have the ability to restore themselves with out it.
Magnesium is a part of your enamel. A 2016 research in Acta Biomaterialia discovered that magnesium ions react with tooth enamel by way of a course of known as dissolution and re-precipitation — actually restructuring the crystal lattice on the floor — and the outcome was more durable, extra resilient enamel. A follow-up research in Acta Biomaterialia (2020) confirmed it: roughly a 20% improve in nanohardness.
However right here’s the place it will get scary…
When your magnesium is low, your saliva loses the flexibility to deposit calcium and phosphate again into your enamel. That course of — remineralization — is how your enamel repair tiny cracks and harm each single day. With out sufficient magnesium, that restore system can sluggish to a crawl — or stall fully. You may have the most effective brushing routine on the planet, and your enamel should still be shedding floor.
Take into consideration that. Your physique has a built-in tooth restore system. And most of the people could have by accident turned it off.
Your mind is shrinking. Magnesium could sluggish it down.
A 2023 research within the European Journal of Diet (Alateeq et al.) tracked over 6,000 adults ages 40–73 and measured magnesium consumption in opposition to mind quantity on MRI. The discovering stopped me chilly: individuals consuming greater magnesium had brains that appeared roughly one 12 months youthful by age 55. Bigger whole quantity. Fewer white matter lesions. Higher-preserved areas for studying and reminiscence.
One 12 months youthful. From a mineral that prices pennies a day.
Ladies noticed even better neuroprotective advantages within the Alateeq research — and the reason being alarming. Between 30 and 40% of menopausal ladies have scientific hypomagnesemia (low magnesium) with out understanding it. Estrogen helps regulate magnesium retention, so when estrogen drops throughout perimenopause and menopause, magnesium plummets with it. And magnesium is what permits your physique to really use vitamin D — so when you’re supplementing vitamin D (as most ladies over 40 are instructed to), it could not even be working with out sufficient magnesium. It’s a cascading failure that just about no one is connecting the dots on.
Wow! Bigger brains. Fewer lesions. Measurably youthful construction. And this wasn’t a small research — it was over 6,000 individuals tracked with MRI. The researchers even discovered that the neuroprotective advantages of upper magnesium have been better for ladies than males throughout each measure they checked out.
When you’re anxious about staying sharp as you age — about reminiscence, about focus, about your mind simply… working — this one mineral could matter greater than nearly something I’ve seen in 40 years of studying analysis.
This could possibly be why you’re grinding your enamel at 3am.
A double-blind, placebo-controlled scientific trial revealed within the Journal of Analysis in Medical Sciences (Abbasi et al., 2012) gave topics 500mg of magnesium each day for 8 weeks. The outcomes: statistically vital will increase in sleep time, sleep effectivity, and melatonin ranges — and vital decreases in cortisol (the stress hormone) and sleep onset latency. They fell asleep sooner. They stayed asleep longer. Their stress hormones dropped.
When my sufferers began sleeping higher, one thing surprising occurred: they stopped grinding and clenching at night time.
The jaw relaxed. The enamel stopped cracking. The sensitivity dropped.
I take magnesium each night time, 1–2 hours earlier than mattress. If I skip a dose — particularly when touring or in a brand new time zone — I discover.
Now — vital caveat from a dentist who’s been skilled in sleep medication: magnesium will not be an alternative to treating a sleep respiratory dysfunction. When you snore, gasp, or cease respiratory at night time, that’s a distinct dialog fully, and you have to see an AADSM-trained dentist or sleep doctor or you may even begin with a session with a myofunctional therapist. However for the tens of millions of people that don’t get sufficient magnesium — who lie awake, who wake at 2am, who by no means really feel rested — this mineral is the very first thing I’d have a look at.
Sleep isn’t nearly power. Sleep is when your physique repairs. Your mind prompts the glymphatic system — clearing beta-amyloid and tau proteins linked to Alzheimer’s and cognitive decline. Your mouth restores its protecting mineral steadiness. Minimize your sleep high quality, and all the things downstream suffers — blood sugar, anxiousness, cravings, blood stress. I’ve seen it in hundreds of sufferers.
Right here’s what terrifies me about most magnesium dietary supplements.
After I spotted how important magnesium was, I began taking a well-liked model. Good label. Robust opinions. I felt good about it.
Then I learn the impartial lab outcomes.
I pay for a membership to ConsumerLab — an impartial lab that’s been testing dietary supplements since 1999. They’re not sponsored by any model. They purchase merchandise off the shelf, take a look at them for purity, efficiency, and contamination, and publish the outcomes. Consider it like Shopper Stories, however for dietary supplements. Their testing has flagged a number of common magnesium merchandise for contamination with lead, cadmium, and arsenic. The very factor I used to be taking to guard my well being could have been quietly including to my poisonous load. I finished instantly.
And that’s not the one downside. Most dietary supplements include only one type of magnesium. However your physique makes use of magnesium in tons of of various processes — your mind wants a distinct type than your muscle mass, which want a distinct type than your bones and enamel. Taking only one type is like placing gasoline in your automotive however by no means altering the oil, the coolant, or the brake fluid.
There are seven important types, and every one targets one thing totally different. Most merchandise provide you with one. Possibly two.
Right here’s what most individuals don’t understand till it’s too late.
You may’t essentially really feel when a magnesium deficiency is going on.
Customary blood exams don’t even catch it — solely about 1% of your physique’s magnesium is in your blood serum, and NHANES hasn’t even measured serum magnesium ranges in its nationwide well being survey since 1974. You may be deeply poor and your labs would look completely regular. The medical system actually isn’t in search of it.
By the point you discover the delicate enamel, the mind fog, the jaw ache, the insomnia — it’s attainable that, by that time, you’ve been operating on empty for years. And every single day with out sufficient magnesium is a day your enamel, your mind, and your sleep fall a bit additional behind.
Right here’s how deep this goes:
A 2017 randomized scientific trial (Tarleton et al., PLOS One) discovered that magnesium supplementation produced clinically vital enhancements in each despair and anxiousness — and the results confirmed up in simply two weeks. Whoa.
A dose-response meta-analysis in BMC Drugs (Fang et al., 2016) discovered that each further 100mg/day of dietary magnesium was related to a 22% decrease danger of coronary heart failure. A separate meta-analysis in Diabetes Care discovered an identical dose-response: each 100mg/day increment was linked to a 14% discount in sort 2 diabetes danger throughout 13 cohort research involving over 536,000 individuals.
And a landmark 2018 paper within the Open Coronary heart journal known as subclinical magnesium deficiency “a principal driver of heart problems and a public well being disaster.” Not a contributor. A principal driver. And that’s a peer-reviewed cardiovascular journal saying it.
This isn’t one thing you repair later. Later is how individuals find yourself with cracked molars at 55, or early cognitive decline, or a mouth stuffed with dental work that might have been prevented.
What I personally take — and why I switched.
After the heavy steel scare, I spent months researching. I wanted a magnesium that was third-party examined for purity, and that contained all seven types so my mind, my muscle mass, my bones, my enamel, and my nervous system have been all truly getting what they wanted.
I discovered one. It’s the one one I’ve come throughout that checks each field — and it handed ConsumerLab’s impartial testing for purity, efficiency, and heavy metals.
You may see exactly what it is and why I vetted it here, however I’ll say this:
Since switching, my enamel are much less delicate. My sleep is deeper. My spouse and I each take it. It’s maybe the one complement that if I have been pressured to drop all the things else, I’d hold.
See the exact magnesium I take every night.
Practically half of us are poor. Nearly none of us comprehend it. And the results are silent till they’re not.
— Dr. Mark Burhenne (Dr. B)
P.S. I’ve had sufferers inform me this one change — simply getting the correct magnesium — did extra for his or her enamel than years of pricey dental work mixed. I want I may return and inform each affected person I’ve ever had. As a substitute, I’m telling you.
Additional Studying & Citations
My earlier deep dives on magnesium:
Research cited on this e-newsletter:
1. Jia et al. (2016). “Diagenesis-inspired response of magnesium ions with floor enamel mineral modifies properties of human enamel.” Acta Biomaterialia, 37, 174–183. PubMed
2. Jia et al. (2020). “Magnesium incorporation into major dental enamel and its impact on mechanical properties.” Acta Biomaterialia, 120, 190–200. PubMed
3. Alateeq, Ok., Walsh, E.I. & Cherbuin, N. (2023). “Dietary magnesium consumption is said to bigger mind volumes and decrease white matter lesions with notable intercourse variations.” European Journal of Diet, 62(5), 2039–2051. PubMed
4. Abbasi, B. et al. (2012). “The impact of magnesium supplementation on major insomnia in aged: A double-blind placebo-controlled scientific trial.” Journal of Analysis in Medical Sciences, 17(12), 1161–1169. PubMed
5. Tarleton, E.Ok. et al. (2017). “Position of magnesium supplementation within the remedy of despair: A randomized scientific trial.” PLOS One, 12(6), e0180067. PubMed
6. Fang, X. et al. (2016). “Dietary magnesium consumption and the danger of heart problems, sort 2 diabetes, and all-cause mortality: a dose-response meta-analysis of potential cohort research.” BMC Drugs, 14, 210. PubMed
7. Dong, J.Y. et al. (2011). “Magnesium consumption and danger of sort 2 diabetes: meta-analysis of potential cohort research.” Diabetes Care, 34(9), 2116–2122. PubMed
8. DiNicolantonio, J.J., O’Keefe, J.H. & Wilson, W. (2018). “Subclinical magnesium deficiency: a principal driver of heart problems and a public well being disaster.” Open Coronary heart, 5(1), e000668. PubMed
