Orthodontics
 What does Orthodontics mean?
Orthodontics is easy to understand when the word is broken into its roots. “Ortho” means straight or correct. “Odont” means tooth. An orthodontist is a dentist with special training who uses braces and other corrective appliances to straighten teeth, correct jaw position and improve facial balance.
How can Orthodontics help me?
Straight teeth not only help your appearance, your health can improve, too. If you have crooked teeth, you may feel self conscious or hesitant to smile or talk with your friends. You may even cover your mouth when you laugh or keep it closed when you have your picture taken. When you feel better about your looks, you’ll feel better about yourself, and your whole outlook on life can improve.
Can Adults also benefit?
Whether you are six or 60, appearance is an important aspect of your life. Your smile, in particular, affects your looks and helps communicate your thoughts and emotions.
An improved smile enhances self-confidence. When you look good, you feel good about yourself. This confidence can overflow into many areas of your life, including your personal and business relationships.
Adults and children can have many of the same benefits from orthodontics. The biological process involved in moving the teeth is the same for both age groups. Treatment may take a little longer for adults.
What causes Orthodontic Problems?
Bad bites can be inherited or acquired. Just as we inherit eye color, mouth and jaw features are also inherited.
Features that can lead to problems include teeth that have too much or too little space between them or extra or missing teeth. Tooth size and jaw size are both inherited. This can result in crowding or spacing of the teeth. Overbites, underbites and deep bites also can be inherited.
Bad bites also can be acquired. Causes can include habits you had as a young child, such as thumb or finger sucking or tongue thrusting. Accidents, losing your baby teeth or permanent teeth too early and enlarged tonsils and adenoids, resulting in mouth breathing also can cause bad bites.
Do orthodontic treatments only improve looks?
No, there are a lot of other problems.
- It is more difficult to keep teeth clean when they are crooked. Thus increasing cavities.
- Poor bite can cause extra stress on chewing muscles, causing problems with your jaw joints.
- Poor bite can interfere with proper jaw development.
- Protruding teeth are more easily chipped or fractured
- Teeth that are out of their proper position are more likely to wear down faster than those that are properly aligned.
How will the problem be corrected?
 First, pretreatment records are gathered. Those records include; plaster study models of your teeth, photos of your face and teeth and x-rays of your mouth and head.
Treatment usually consists of applying braces to the teeth or using other appliances, which gradually move the teeth or jaws into their correct position. Many of today’s braces are far less noticeable than those of the past. Braces consist primarily of brackets and interconnecting wires. Brackets are bonded to the teeth.
When braces are removed, it is usually necessary to wear a retainer for a period of time. A retainer keeps the teeth in their new, correct positions until the tissues surrounding them stabilize.
How long does the treatment usually last?
Treatment time varies depending upon a number of factors: the severity of the problem, the health of the teeth, gums and supporting bone, the patient’s age and how closely he or she follows instructions. The average treatment for children and teens is 2-3 years. Adult treatment can sometimes take longer.
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