What Are The Benefits of Early Orthodontic Treatment?
Ideally, your kid won’t need any interventions from an early age. We can monitor dental growth periodically and promote the healthy development of your kid’s dental structures, reserving any treatment for the most ideal time.
Early orthodontic evaluation provides timely detection of problems and greater opportunities for more effective treatment. Prudent intervention guides growth and development, preventing serious problems later. Some of the most direct results of interceptive treatment are:
- Creating room for crowded, erupting teeth.
- Creating facial symmetry by influencing jaw growth.
- Reducing the risk of trauma to protruding front teeth.
- Preserving space for unerupted teeth.
- Reducing the need for a tooth removal.
- Reducing treatment time with braces.
How to Have Good Oral Hygiene
Orthodontics is not merely for improving the esthetics of the smile; treatment improves bad bites (malocclusions). Malocclusions occur as a result of tooth or jaw misalignment. Malocclusions affect the way you smile, chew, clean your teeth or feel about your smile.
According to studies by the American Association of Orthodontists, untreated malocclusions can result in a variety of problems:
- Crowded teeth are more difficult to brush properly and floss, which may contribute to tooth decay and/or gum disease.
- Protruding teeth are more susceptible to accidental chipping.
- Crossbites can result in unfavorable growth and uneven tooth wear.
- Open bites can result in tongue-thrusting habits and speech impediments.
- Ultimately, orthodontics makes more than a pretty smile – it creates a healthier you.
Is Early Orthodontic Treatment Worth It?
Early orthodontic treatment, also known as Phase I treatment, is important because it allows orthodontists to identify and address potential issues with jaw growth, bite alignment, and tooth development while a child’s mouth is still growing. By intervening at a younger age—often between 7 and 10 years old—orthodontists can guide proper jaw development, create more space for incoming permanent teeth, and reduce the risk of more severe problems later on. This early approach can simplify or even shorten future orthodontic treatment, improve oral function, and set the foundation for a healthier, more confident smile.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Early orthodontics is the most critical decision you can make to anticipate the development of orthodontic problems in your kid, which could significantly impact adulthood. Age is crucial to detect potential anomalies. At age seven, your kid will start getting their first adult molars, so this is the perfect time to take measures. Early orthodontics helps solve problems related to proper jaw spacing for new teeth (potential crowding), misalignments, and jaw mismatching and to start a plan to guide its development with phase one orthodontic treatment.
The course of action for early orthodontic treatment is to reduce the invasiveness and intensity of orthodontic treatment in adolescents and adults. Children might show early signs of jaw discrepancies and crowded front teeth. As the mandible and maxilla grow and develop in adolescence, their discrepancy might also increase, and so does treatment invasiveness to correct a malocclusion. Therefore, during Phase 1, Orthodontists guide the development of the teeth and jaws to ease phase two of orthodontics in adolescence.
The American Association of Orthodontists (AAO) recommends a first orthodontic visit at age seven. This visit determines the need for starting Phase 1 Orthodontic and Orthopedic Treatment, which might require using removable appliances or waiving this phase and waiting for the kid to become an adolescent to reevaluate the case and determine the suitability to start treatment with braces or clear aligners.
Phase 1 Orthodontic Treatment remodels the jaw to create enough space for incoming adult teeth. In this phase, the orthodontist projects the correct fitting of the maxilla and mandible, so they can perfectly match at the bite. For instance, an orthodontist might use a palatal expander that benefits from bite force to grow the jaw to accommodate incoming adult teeth. This intervention prevents the extraction of teeth in Phase 2 Orthodontic Treatment.
It lessens the possibility of a more traumatic intervention later in adolescence or at a more mature age. Moreover, the treatments intervention might accomplish one or more of the following goals: make room for erupting teeth to avoid crowding; work on the kid’s facial symmetry by promoting jaw growth; minimize potential trauma on protruding front teeth; keep sufficient space for forthcoming adult teeth; minimize or null the need for teeth extractions and; make braces treatment during adolescence more effective and efficient.
