Face Lifts
Before having a surgical facelift consider this
approach
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Allergies
Perhaps you are allergic or sensitive to some of
the materials used in dentistry
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Migraines
Teeth being as little as 1mm out can be enough to
give crippling migraines
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Face Lifts
More and more people are having cosmetic surgery, many having face lifts. There are all sorts of creams and potions to iron out those wrinkles and creases. Often the wrinkles are due to our teeth wearing down so that the lower face height gets smaller (the distance between the tip of our noses and the tip of our chin gets closer together in time). This causes our face and mouth to be over closed resulting in wrinkles. If this is the cause, it is possible to build the teeth up to the correct size and perhaps by adding a little to the fronts of the teeth the lips can be padded out, those creases in the corners pushed out and those wrinkles stretched a little. All in all the lines are reduced or disappear with no painful surgery.
Will I like the result?
It is quite possible to build everything up
temporarily just to see the end result first,
before committing to the permanent treatment.
Allergies
There are more and more people allergic to different chemicals these days, There is the old argument about the mercury in black fillings and although there is little definitive scientific proof showing its toxicity in the general public it can be shown in some individuals to be a big problem. There are however other materials used in dentistry that people are more and more sensitive to, the commonest ones being the metals (commonly including gold) used to fuse porcelain to in metal bonded crowns. If you are sensitive to metals or think you might be, perhaps one of the porcelain bonded to tooth would be more appropriate. Have you got red gums next to an existing crown? This is usually due to the crown not fitting properly or not being cleaned properly or it might just be that you are sensitive to the metal that it is made of.
Migraines
For those patients that suffer regularly from migraines they will know how awful they can be. They can often be brought about by stress. This is due to the increased muscle tightness as the jaw clenches together (also the cause of tension head-aches). It has been shown that Botox reduces migraines in some sufferers this is because Botox paralyses the muscle so that it no longer works, thus the tension goes. In cutting edge work done at the Las Vegas Institute recently using instruments measuring the activity of the muscles of the jaw it was shown that most of us have teeth that do not come to rest in the most comfortable position. If the bite is out by as much as 1mm in some people they can suffer debilitating migraines that last for days. By studying neuro-muscular activity it has been consistently shown that people with occlusion related migraines and head-aches can be cured by adjusting the way they bite together. In the past dentists have simply made a splint that can be worn to alter the bite, although sometimes something as simple as this might work, unless it puts your teeth into a new position which is correct then you might still have all your problems, and sometimes more! This process of finding the correct bite is relatively simple using the right equipment although it does take several visits over a few months to get the result perfect. Just to take impressions of the teeth, make a bite guard by guessing is not really the answer. If the teeth are made to fit in the correct physiological position for the minimum muscle activity at rest then the migraines should disappear permanently.