Tooth Grinding/Bruxism Guards
Patients will often be unaware of uncontrollable habits slowly destroying their teeth, damaging the TMJs, or causing muscle fatigue and headaches. Chronic clenching and grinding will not only wear teeth or break fillings, but may lead to degenerative joint disease and tooth loss.
Balancing the bite and reducing functional interferences with a bite guard or splint may reduce inproper sensory input and help alleviate patient symptoms and protect the teeth from uncontrollable destructive habits.
Bruxism and bite guards are generally a long term solution for patients with uncontrollable nighttime grinding. Patients involved with TMD/TMJ therapy will generally wear a splint for a period of months to determine if this reversible treatment is beneficial. Eventually, these patients may require orthodontics or full mouth rehabilitation to stabilize and restore the bite.
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Sleep Appliances
Oral appliances are a treatment option of choice for patient's with intolerance to CPAP and have certain types of mild to moderate sleep apnea. Sleep appliances are used to open and maintain the airway so patients can reduce apnea events and wake up well rested. Custom fabricated appliances are more durable and effective than homemade devices. Unhappy with your CPAP? Call for a consult today.
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Athletic Mouth Guards
We are pleased to offer our patients custom-fabricated mouthguards for sports activities. Unlike stock mouthguards, which fit loosely because they are designed to accommodate many possible wearers, our sports mouthguards are tailored to fit your exact dental profile, providing the highest attainable level of comfort and security in a mouthguard.
The first step in fabricating these mouthguards is to take an impression of your teeth. We then use that impression and fabricate the mouthguard using special professional-grade materials. The perfect fit of these custom-fabricated mouthguards ensures that not only will your mouthguards fit comfortably, they will also offer the most protection and will interfere the least with speech or breathing.
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Occlusal Adjustment & Bite Balancing
An occlusal stabilization splint, also known as a “bite splint”, is a hard plastic retainer placed over either the top or bottom row of your teeth. It is designed to help prevent or slow the damage done to teeth by grinding or clenching. Nighttime grinding and clenching can wear down the tooth enamel, eventually leading to major dental procedures such as root canals, tooth extractions, crown placements and oral surgery. With a properly designed occlusal splint, the wear on this enamel is decreased, therefore slowing the damage to the teeth.
Occlusal splints are also known to help sufferers of disorders of the temporomandibular joint (TMJ). An occlusal splint aligns the top and bottom teeth optimally to protect and reduce the movements that irritate this joint. For patients with damaged jaw joints, the decrease in twisting or delocation of the jaw joint that the occlusal splint provides can be especially helpful.
Occlusal splints are also an excellent choice for patients who have had extensive or expensive dental restorations or smile redesigns performed, as occlusal splints could help protect these restorations from damage and wear while the patient sleeps. It is important to note, however, that occlusal splints are not, and cannot, be designed to entirely eliminate the damage done to the biting surface of teeth. Instead, they are designed to slow the damage done, and hopefully in the process help the patient avoid undergoing more extensive dental work in the future.
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Full Mouth Rehabilitation
Patients with extensive tooth wear, TMJ problems, and bone loss may require restoration and repositioning of their teeth and jaws to rehabilitate the masticatory system to ideal form and function.
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