For instance, my brother has straight, white teeth that never required braces where as my sister and I both had braces at a young age and now in adulthood could use more alignment.
Did he have superior mouth genes to us? Maybe he didn’t suck his thumb and we did?
Also why is it that braces are used in our youth? Isn’t it a better idea wait until the head and body are done growing to adjust the orthodontia? It seems so silly to do it when everything around them is still growing, moving and adjusting. It also seems unrealistic to expect a child to properly maintain the specific hygiene for braces.
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The idea that it’s better to wait until everything is done growing is a v outdated idea in ortho. You will occasionally find an orthodontist who thinks this way, but the majority of them now prefer to begin intervention much, much earlier- simpler methods can be used, for less time, in stages. The thinking is that children’s bones have not completely fused and “set”- it’s much easier to guide things into place as a child is growing.
A 6 year old patient who is just getting her adult molars might have an extremely narrow jaw, with no room for the much larger teeth that she’s going to get in the coming years. Older thinking would be to either pull healthy adult teeth as they come in, allow her to reach adulthood, then subject her to jaw surgery and lots of hardware to try to correct the problem. NOW, it’s much easier to place something called a palatal expander on the roof of her mouth, and with a turn of a little key every day or every other day, widen her palate (bc there is a fissure line down the roof of the mouth that’s not filled in with bone). Over time, as she grows, she will gain enough room for the adult teeth she’s going to have. She might never need actual braces if this is corrected early enough. This is all much more preferable to waiting until the patient is in their late teens, may have suffered self-esteem issues through school (I know I did), or physical pain due to orthodontic issues. Early intervention is usually less complicated and less painful for a patient (and usually less expense for the parent). It means more years of health for the patient. So now we are much more likely to recommend some sort of orthodontic intervention early in a child’s life.
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