Sleeping with your mouth open is really unhealthy

If you happen to fall back on your pillows for a deep sleep while snoring, we have some bad news…

New findings from the Journal of Oral Rehabilitation has pointed to sleeping with your mouth open as a leading cause for damaging your teeth – with researchers claiming it can be worse than sipping at fizzy drinks. The reason for the tooth erosion is down to breathing while sleeping through an open mouth, which removes the protective effect of saliva, aimed at naturally killing off the bacteria in your mouth. As your acid levels rise during the night, tooth erosion and decay then begin to occur in your mouth. Under normal conditions, the pH level in a mouth is a neutral level of 7.7. The research found that sleeping with your mouth open brought your pH level into the acidity range at 6.6. While men are most likely to be affected, tooth decay from this exposure is more common in people who suffer with asthma and obstructive sleep apnoea – as they are more likely to breathe through the mouth at night.