Space Maintainers for Children
If your child loses a baby tooth early through decay or injury, the child’s other teeth could shift and begin to fill the vacant space. When your child’s permanent teeth emerge, there’s not enough room for them. The result is crooked or crowded teeth and difficulties with chewing or speaking.
To prevent that, your dentist inserts a space maintainer to hold the spot left by the lost tooth until the permanent tooth emerges. The space maintainer might be a band or a temporary crown attached to one side of the vacant space. Later, as the permanent tooth emerges, your dentist removes the device. And your child is ready for a lifetime of smiles.
Appliances for Thumb Sucking
An orthodontic appliance corrects a habit of inserting a habit instrument, such as a thumb, within a mouth. A wire frame of the appliance has two distal ends which are doubled over and each received within a respective lingual sheath carried on a maxillary molar. Two first portions of the wire member extend anteriorly from each distal end, and each has a U-shaped loop for adjusting the position of the appliance within the mouth. Two second portions each extend anteriorly from a respective first portion, and curve downwardly through a gap formed by an overjet condition between the upper and lower incisors. A guard portion is coupled to the two curved portions and has two circular loops formed within the wire member. The two circular loops are located anteriorly with respect to the lower incisors and posteriorly with respect to the labial vestibule when the mouth is closed, and deter the insertion of a thumb (or other habit instrument) upon opening and subsequent closure of the mouth.
Bite Plate/ Night Guard Appliance
If designed correctly, nighttime appliances help keep teeth from moving, protect ceramic restorations, and protect teeth from wear damage caused by grinding or clenching. A night guard is a plastic mouth guard worn at night to prevent tooth grinding. A bite plate is a removable plastic device, which prevents teeth from coming together. In some cases, such as with an overbite, it may eventually improve the bite. A method used to treat the damage caused by more serious cases of grinding involves reshaping or reconstruction of the biting surfaces with crowns or inlays or a full mouth.
Appliance to modify jaw growth
Functional Appliances are removable or fixed [cemented] appliances that alter the posture of the mandible [lower jaw] and transmit the forces created by the resulting stretch of the muscles and soft tissues and by the change in the neuromuscular environment to the dental and skeletal tissues to produce movement of the teeth and modification to the growth of the jaws and lower face.