Causes of changes to your bite – It’s more than you think! Part 2

For those who love caffeine, it starts our day, keeps us going throughout the day, gives us a kick when we are partying, and for many, keeps us up at night!

Caffeine can cause the mouth to become relatively dry, making saliva less protective of teeth. The coating of the teeth, the enamel, becomes soft and is easily worn. It also makes it more easily attacked by chemical reactions caused by bacteria eating sugars. There are now wonderful package deals available to really wreck your teeth. These include high caffeine soft drinks that are also acidic and contain loads of sugar.

Smoking

The effects of smoking on the body are well documented and the teeth and mouth are no exception. Quitting smoking has numerous benefits for the oral health such as:

• Less staining of teeth; cigarette smoke causes one of the most difficult to remove stains on the teeth which require frequent professional cleans to remove

• Better sense of taste and smell

• Less bad breath

• Reduced occurrence of dry mouth

• Improvement in the state of your gums; smoking is one of the main causes of periodontal disease where teeth become loose and are lost over time

• Less chance of infection of the oral cavity and sinuses as your immune system recovers and is better able to fight off bacteria

• Reduced risk of oral lesions such as cancer

This can be the major cause of the bite. Cancer the in mouth, when it affects the bone, can lead to severe surgery, where the affected bone, with its teeth, needs to be removed. This is called excision of the cancer from the body. It’s not a treatment that anyone wants to go through.

The prevention of it is to stop smoking. That’s all I have to say.

Dry mouth

The incidence of dry mouth is on the rise. As the population ages, the use of medication increases as the survival rate increases. A large side effect of medications is a dry mouth. Many respiratory and alimentary conditions can create a dry mouth. Of course, dental problems can lead to dry mouth, as well as social habits.

The mouth cops it from all directions, both internally and externally.

To make matters worse, the state of a dry mouth can exacerbate health conditions and even cause an even drier mouth! Vicious cycle!

A dry mouth leads to saliva to be less watery and more mucus. The mucus makes it harder to swallow and digest food. The thick gluggy mucus interferes with breathing making person cough continuously. This tires the person out.

The surface of the mouth and tongue become very sore and even have a burning sensation which can be unbearable. Any inflammation in the body produces chemicals that is attracted to other areas of the body that are inflamed. Hence the vicious cycle

The normal watery saliva acts like a buffer to neutralise acidity in the mouth and on the teeth. Dry mouth is prone to acid loving bacteria that cause decay and gum problems. The acid environment dissolves the surface of the enamel making it soft and worn easily. Another viscous cycle!

Jaw Growth

This is where genetics plays a role in affecting the bite. Orthodontics is the field of dentistry that is all about changing the bite, and the bone too.

Early intervention in the growth of child can prevent further complications in life.

This case is called a pseudo class III malocclusion.

Yes, it’s a bit different but the solution is simple and short term.

The upper central incisor teeth have grown to be behind the lower teeth when biting together. Her teeth are generally crowded. So, it looks she will need full orthodontic treatment when she is older.

This arrangement of teeth has caused to lower jaw to jut forward. If left alone, the lower jaw will grow more forward than the upper jaw.

 It’s not meant to be!

How do we know that?

We check the real bite of the teeth by opening the mouth and slowly closing the lower jaw until the teeth touch together. In this case the upper teeth touch the top edge of the lower teeth. As the person continues to close on the teeth, the upper teeth slide behind the lower teeth and the lower jaw postures forward.

What can be done?

We make an appliance that is worn in mouth as part of a removable plate. It has embedded in it two springs (called Z-springs) that push the upper central incisors forward. There are also clasps in the plate that hold the appliance onto the back teeth.

Once the bite has been corrected once the patient can close their teeth naturally without any forward movement of the lower jaw,

The facial profile has no prominent chin and the front and back teeth bite in a comfortable bite.

This a very, very small taste of what orthodontics can do.

Next in this series: Causes of changes to your bite – It’s more than you think! Part 3