Teeth with abrasions because of the roar

Mrs.Hadjipanagiotidou the roaring or otherwise grinding of the teeth at night is a common phenomenon, what consequences can it have on the patient's mouth? Is treatment possible?

What is the roar in the teeth

Indeed, in recent years we have noticed a constant increase in tooth clenching at night. We see it all the time in our surgeries from the results of it, do we understand it ourselves or does the patient tell us. I have to say that half of the patients who clench their teeth know it and half don't know it and they should be told by a professional that you clench your teeth at night in your sleep.

Results of the roar

What are the results, what do I see in a mouth when one clenches at night. The first thing I can see is the abrasions on his teeth i.e. the dental tissue has been lost from chewing surfaces and the cutting surfaces of the teeth. The tooth has two levels outside has the enamel, further in has the dentin and further in is the nerve trunk of the tooth. In imprinted teeth, the outer enamel is usually lost near the chewing surface and the dentin is now visible, which is also usually more yellow. So a patient when a dentist opens his mouth the first thing a dentist sees and realizes that he is clenching at night is the abrasions, he is missing the tooth substance.

Gelation of the gums

The second thing that is caused is the lifting of the gums, when I clench my teeth my gums lift because of the forces exerted during the roar which are enormous, there are many, many big forces exerted under the roar are close to 150 kilos. These forces go to the jawbone.

As we know the teeth with its roots are located and supported in the bone of the jaw. When we clench the clenching forces go towards the jawbone which reflexively absorbs and follows along with the gum so we often see raised gums in different parts of the mouth. And a patient may tell us that I feel, my teeth are cold, I feel sensitivity when I brush, I drink cold something hurts and that can be a very common reason why someone comes to the dental office and we eventually find out that they are clenching their teeth.

And the third thing that the roar does is alter our proto-temporal erosion. So here in the blinking of the jaw we hear noises there may be some pain, some slight movement of the mandible or even swelling in the area. Many times it is confused with pain in the wisdom tooth pain in the whole area of the lower, upper jaw without somehow specifically identifying the pain and where finally after the clinical examination we understand that the patient is clenching his teeth at night.

What causes the clenching of the teeth

The tightness is caused by stress. It is a result of stress and unfortunately as I said earlier in the last few years it had increased very much. I have to say that more than 60% now of the world clench their teeth at night in their sleep. That is more common to clench than not to clench at night. I also have to say that while you could say do whatever and one would expect that since it is caused by stress a treatment, with anxiolytic or antidepressant pills which are also common nowadays in use would improve the situation. It must be said that the use of antidepressants increases the roar because it works on the brain chemistry in such a way that muscle tone is affected and so the patient is not able to control muscle tone as well. So the use of antidepressants increases the roar.

Treatment of the roar

So we have a given that the roar has increased in recent years, what is the treatment for it, in order not to end up with all these unpleasant results for our mouth. Unfortunately the treatment is only symptomatic, it is the use of what we call the nathika roar at night in our sleep. The most common treatment is this, we take an impression in the office our dental technician makes an impression for each patient. We fit it in the mouth and the patient wears it every time they sleep, even at noon if they fall asleep they wear their chewing gum.

There are patients who tighten more and others who tighten less. There are patients who clamp all the time or some clamp mainly in periods of very intense stress for such a patient we could say that he can use it periodically for the rest. Unfortunately the treatment is lifetime unless after a few years they change their philosophy, change their lifestyle and eventually they don't stress as much. Another way of treatment is botox on the chewers. That is, we botox the chewing muscles so that they can't tighten as much and so all these problems of tightness and squeaking can't be caused.

How can a smile with gritted teeth be fixed?

So apart from all these issues, there are also aesthetic issues from some point onwards. Patients come in with their front teeth cut are shorter than they were before and they want length restoration, that's an issue that we have to deal with is complex.

We have to do an initial study of the mouth, we take impressions and send them to the dental technician and he makes an initial diagnostic wax. What is the diagnostic wax: from the casts the plaster casts resulting from the impression of the mouth our plaster mouth. The dental technician adds a candle in front of our teeth and shapes them into the shape we would like the teeth to be in.

Then the patient comes in after we have the diagnostic wax in our hands and based on the diagnostic wax we place a material. A temporary material, the competition wax in the patient's mouth and so the patient sees how his teeth will be immediately after any intervention we do on them. Usually what happens is that we have to lift the joint because all the abrasions have been done from the back to the front that is and in the back there is a cut tooth surface and in the front so in order to be able to restore the length of the front teeth we have to restore the length of the back teeth so that the teeth can all press together normally.

 

Tooth restoration with resins

It depends at what point the patient comes to the clinic if we are at an initial point, all this restoration can be done with resins which is the simplest thing. So I can add some resin to the chewing surfaces of the back teeth so I can lift the joint and then my front teeth, the length of the front teeth to restore that as well with resins.

Tooth restoration with porcelains

If the tooth loss is a little more severe then my front teeth may need porcelain veneers. The porcelains can be put in with porcelain veneers either porcelain cases, porcelain rim cases, porcelain crown cases as appropriate. The back teeth do not necessarily need to be restored with porcelain as well. The height of the back teeth can in a medium abrasion be restored with resins. Now if we have huge abrasions and too much loss of tooth substance then we usually talk about restoring the whole mouth with porcelain either with porcelain cases or in the back teeth with inlays and veneers depending on the case of each patient.

Restoration of the smile

What of course I must say is that restoring a smile with abrasions i.e. short front teeth, cut front teeth could be said to be one of the most important anti-aging treatments, if someone asks what to do to make my smile look younger, youthful it would certainly be to say that it restored the original length of your teeth and the color plays a very big role i.e. if one can do teeth whitening to change the color of his teeth and certainly the length of his teeth, which when we are young 18, 20, 22 is usually intact.

As the years go by you will have noticed that the length of people's teeth is decreasing and with use that is not necessary for someone to tighten even with the use that is done over the years the chewing surfaces and the cutting surfaces of the teeth slowly wear away if one restores the original length of the teeth then we can really talk about an in-quote or out-of-quote anti-aging treatment. All these treatments can be carried out at the dental office of Mrs. Hadjipanagiotidou in Glyfada.

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