I’ve been using a mouth guard to help on my TMJ Disorder. It’s helped a little but my dentist is suggesting that because I’ve worn my teeth down, the best treatment would be to put crowns on all the worn down teeth. These seems pretty radical to me? Is this normal or is my dentist just making a money grab?
Carol
Dear Carol,
Crowning teeth that have been worn down for bruxism is a fairly standard treatment to both help treat and prevent TMJ Disorder. When your bite is off, it throws off the temporomandibular joint. The thing to look out for is making sure your dentist is qualified. Knowing what treatment to use and having the training to provide that treatment are two very different things.
Going to dental school will not be enough. If not done correctly, it could end up making your bite worse. It takes very specialized training to know how to crown every tooth. Unfortunately, there is not a recognized speciality in TMJ Disorder, so you are going to have to find out what type of post-doctoral training your dentist has.
There are some great institutions that provide the post doctoral training needed to do this well. See if your dentist went to any of these institutions:
- The Pankey Institute
- The Las Vegas Institute for Advanced Dental Studies
- The Dawson Academy
- Spear Institute
- Piper Education and Research Center
If your dentist does not have training in TMJ from one of these institutes, you have two options. First, you can look around for another dentist in your area who does or you can look for a prosthodontist. These have extra training in occlusion, which is essential for placing these correctly.
This blog is brought to you by Libertyville Dentist Dr. David Potts.
Click here to learn about dental implants.