What can you do about aching gums?

The most important points in brief

• If you suffer acutely or regularly from painful gums, without diseased teeth being responsible, it tarnishes the joy of life.
• However, in most cases it is quite difficult to identify the cause of the pain yourself.
• Sometimes, however, you can carry out a treatment yourself - especially if it is “just” an inflammation.
• Solutions that you can use to rinse your mouth or gels will help.

We all know the situation: the gums hurt. Up to 80 percent of all people in Switzerland regularly suffer from this pain, which in most cases is not really bad, but has a negative impact on everyday life - especially eating and drinking. It is completely okay if you don't go to the doctor right away, but try to relieve the pain yourself first. Because inflamed gums are almost always not bad and will disappear by themselves after a few days.

Inflammation of the gums is almost always the cause

The cause of the pain is often to be found in a cold that you have caught. Often it is even the case that the "normal" symptoms of the common cold such as coughing, runny nose, hoarseness and the like do not appear at all. All the better when you know that there are home remedies that, firstly, keep the pain within tolerable limits and, secondly, also help to subside the symptoms.

Let's start with those tips that seem a bit radical, but they are recommended by oral hygiene experts:

• Massage of the gums: Experts advise gently massaging the areas in question with a soft toothbrush. This not infrequently leads to bleeding gums, but overall it stimulates the blood circulation and thus accelerates the process of self-healing.
• You can also use the toothbrush to massage a tea bag of salt dissolved in water onto the inflamed area. It's a little painful, but it helps.
• The coconut oil also helps if you massage it onto the inflammation.

With a nutritional trick, you can also heal the painful gums quickly - by making sure that you eat as heavily as possible on garlic. Namely, garlic fights inflammation and infection.

Herbs and herbal extracts also help

Essential oils from tea tree, peppermint and cloves as mouth rinses also achieve great results in the fight against pain (pay attention to the dosage, a few drops per glass of water are enough). When it comes to sage and chamomile, the best solution is a lukewarm tea, which you use to rinse out the mouth, it soothes and disinfects. The used tea bags can later be placed cold on the inflamed area and left there for five minutes. However, black tea is even better suited for this.

Ginger can also be used to treat sore gums. Ginger tea has a very positive effect here, drunk as if gargled. The same goes for lavender, you can use it to brew tea and drink it or gargle it. If you prefer the taste of apple cider vinegar, mix two teaspoons of it with water and gargle (but don't drink) this solution. The vinegar fights the bacteria, inhibits inflammation and also stimulates the flow of saliva.