I’ve always had some issues with canker sores that sometimes pop up on the inside of my lips. Normally I just dealt with it by waiting for it to heal on its own or using some watermelon frost, but neither were great methods.

Recently I started directly applying salt to the sore. Last time I did it, it worked pretty well. I’m not sure if the actual time of healing was cut shorter, but it was generally less painful to eat. This time I have another two sores in the inside of my lips and I have been applying salt directly on it every day for 3 straight days. Some things I’ve noticed with this method is that, right after I rinse off the salt, the sore is generally red and most of the grey stuff is not appearing. However, about an hour or two after applying the salt, the sore becomes really white before returning to normal color later. Sometimes, after the “really white” stage, it would become red in the middle (almost looks like it’s bleeding a bit).

My questions are mainly how does applying salt to the sore work? People say it “dries the sore out”, but what does that mean exactly? Also, why does my sore turn really white about an hour after I try this method. Thanks!