Canker sores are small or shallow sores,
bumps that develop inside the mouth. It doesn’t occur on the lips, and it is not contagious.
What Causes Canker Sore?
Well, it all has to do with your diet and the foods that your gut tolerates. Foods like chocolate, coffee, strawberries, eggs, nuts, cheese, spicy foods, and acidic foods can cause canker sores if your gut is sensitive to these categories of food.
Also, a diet without sufficient vitamins B-12, zinc, folate (folic acid), or iron can cause canker sores. It could also be an allergic response to certain bacteria in your mouth. Helicobacter pylori, the same bacteria that causes peptic ulcers.
What Is The White Stuff In A Canker Sore?
As discussed in the above paragraph, spicy foods and vitamin deficiency can cause canker sores. In addition, injuries to the mouth, hormones, stress, or autoimmune disorders can also cause canker sores. Canker sores differ from regular sores or cold sores in that they usually do not require any treatment and heal on their own within a few days.
The white stuff in a canker sore? Actually, there is no white stuff inside canker sores. Those tissues that appear white to the eyes are actually membranes of nerve endings that have opened up in the crater of the canker sore. However, if the sore is outside of the mouth, around the lips, it could be herpes. If it is inside the mouth, however, it is merely the open wound caused by the sore itself.
Why Are Canker Sores So Painful?
Canker sores can actually be more painful than regular sores. This is because the canker sores are obviously inside the mouth, and you will constantly have to put something inside the mouth while regular sores are outside of it. It gets worse if you keep consuming the foods that caused the sore in the first place.
When we get injured, our blood clots and closes up the wound, preventing chemical messengers in the blood from binding to the nerve endings that register pain. Once the vessels (and capillaries) are closed up, there’s way less pain from chemical messengers reaching our nerve endings.
However, in a significant but very superficial wound such as a canker sore, there isn’t enough blood for it to clot and close up properly. This bascially means that painful chemical messengers are constantly leaking and reaching your nerve endings, despite the wound being a lot more superficial and less serious than a bigger wound.
Though canker sores are like any other type of sore but appear in the mouth, they are not contagious. They are not spread through saliva as some other sores are.These shallow lesions develop in two to four clusters but won’t cause any harm. They are extremely painful, and you will want to get rid of them once they develop.
Canker sores eventually clear on their own within one to two weeks. If the symptoms persist, you will have to consult your healthcare providers. For the first week that the soreness develops, it will be difficult for you to eat and drink like you used to. You will have to stay away from some categories of foods, like spicy foods, acidic foods, and certain drinks and junk foods.
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