Do You Need Treatment?
Do you feel like you or child needs treatment? Below are some commonly asked questions:
Does your child suck their thumb/fingers?
Are your child’s bottom teeth in front of their top teeth?
As an adult, are your bottom teeth in front of your top teeth?
Does your child have “buck teeth”?
Are you or your child missing teeth?
Are your teeth crowded?
Do you have a lot of space between your teeth?
Have your teeth moved as an adult?
Does your child suck their thumb/fingers?
If your child continues to suck their thumb/fingers after their baby teeth start falling out, they run the risk of not only moving their teeth but they can actually change the shape of their upper jaw. If left uncorrected, these open bites can lead to a tongue thrust which is extremely difficult to correct.
We have a 95% success rate in stopping finger sucking with a simple pep talk that cost you nothing. If your child cannot stop on their own, then we have 100% success rate with our habit appliances.
Are your child’s bottom teeth in front of their top teeth?
An underbite can be just a tooth problem or it can be that there is a skeletal growth problem. It is important to figure out what the cause of the problem is and intervene early, around age 5.
As an adult, are your bottom teeth in front of your top teeth?
If they are, it can be much more complicated to fix because it is usually not just a tooth problem but is a skeletal problem. Correcting this can involve surgery which is much easier than most people think.
Does your child have “buck teeth”?
Flared upper teeth often coincide with a bad bite. There are several ways to treat this depending on what is causing the problem. Sometimes we will do a phase 1 treatment to reduce the flaring of the top teeth. This can help decrease the chances of a child fracturing their front teeth.
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Are you or your child missing teeth?
If you or your child are missing permanent teeth there are two main treatment options. One is to replace the missing tooth with an implant and crown, the other is to close the space with orthodontics. In this photo, the patient is missing her upper lateral incisors (the ones next to the two front teeth) and we moved her canine teeth into the space. You then have all natural teeth and can save thousands of dollars and a lifetime of implant maintenance.
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Are your teeth crowded?
Sometimes your jaws are just not big enough to fit in all of your teeth. You might have gotten one parent’s jaws and another parent’s teeth and they don’t match up. There are several ways to treat crowding: expanding the arches to accommodate all of the teeth, slenderizing some of the teeth or in extremely crowded cases we might remove some teeth.
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Do you have a lot of space between your teeth?
Spacing is found in children, adolescents, and adults. Spacing can spread out among all of your teeth like in this patient or you could just have a very large space between your two front teeth. Both spacing problems can be treated with traditional braces or Invisalign. Like many orthodontic problems, space closure at an early age helps with stability throughout life.
Have your teeth moved as an adult?
Like everything else with our body, our teeth shift as we get older. As we age, the jaw begins to narrow, which often results in crowding or other orthodontic issues. Invisalign is a great alternative to traditional braces, with fewer appointments, no food restrictions, and no poking wires.
