Diagnosing your Clenching & Grinding
In order to appropriately treat your individual clenching and grinding problem, it is important to know the precise level of your clenching or grinding habit and its pattern while you are sleeping.
This information is gathered when you wearing one of our home sleep tests with a cheek muscle sensor for one night. You bring the test back to us and we plug it into a computer to obtain the necessary information.
This data ensures that we not only treat your unique problem effectively, but also do not perform any therapy you do not absolutely require for your individual situation.
Treating Your Clenching, Grinding & TMJ Concerns
If you clench or grind your teeth, whether it is when you are sleeping or during a stressful day (work stress, driving stress, teenage stress, etc.), you do damage not only to your teeth and surrounding bone and gums, but also to your overall health and comfort.
Clenching and grinding cause tooth wear, accelerate bone loss around teeth (especially when bacteria is present) and accelerate gum recession. Your clenching and grinding will also lead to muscle pain, TMJ pain, and headaches.
Left untreated, these muscle symptoms will worsen and the destructive effects on your overall health, comfort, and well-being will accelerate.
Oral Appliance for Clenching or Grinding
In many instances, you may require nothing more than a nighttime bite appliance or a smaller daytime appliance you can utilize at work. In such a situation, we design and print specific types of appliances to make them as unobtrusive, yet effective, as possible.
Neurotoxin Therapy for Clenching or Grinding
When indicated, we will gently inject neurotoxins into selected muscles. This will help to relax your muscles, decrease the forces you are generating with clenching and grinding, and allow your jaw to return to its proper position. This therapy is quick, easy, and painless.
Utilizing neurotoxins in this manner has no effect on your aesthetics. In addition, you do not have to repeat this neurotoxin therapy every few months as you do with aesthetic neurotoxin treatment.