Last year I wrote a series of posts about my daughter's orthodontics and why we are not using conventional braces for her teeth. It has now been one year since she started using her orthodontic appliance, so I wanted to share our results thus far. My daughter Alina is currently 8 years old and is in the age of "mixed dentition," meaning she has some adult teeth as well as some baby teeth.
How Does the Appliance Work?
Alina is using a one-piece plastic myofunctional appliance made by Ortho-Tain. This appliance is encouraging Alina's palate and jaw to grow so that there will be plenty of space for her adult teeth.
Alina wears her Ortho-Tain orthodontic appliance every night while she sleeps. Because we started early, she does not need to wear the appliance during the daytime at all (whereas if we had waited a few more years before starting, she would have needed to wear it at night as well as for a few hours in the daytime).
Alina has been very cooperative with this whole process and has done a fantastic job of wearing her appliance. Her (wonderful) orthodontist is very pleased with her progress and gives her all the credit for being the one to do the work of wearing the appliance and following his instructions.
Our Results From One Year of Treatment
Over the last year, Alina has progressed through two sizes of orthodontic appliance. This means that her palate and jaw have grown enough to need to increase the size of her appliance!
By the time she had been using her appliance for six months, her minor cross-bite was corrected so that her top and bottom teeth now line up correctly.
And now for the pictures!
Pre-treatment (April 2014) - Alina's baby teeth have no space between them (minus the one spot where she is missing a tooth)
After one year of treatment (May 2015) - Alina has currently lost 8 baby teeth. She has plenty of space for her new top adult teeth.
(May 2015) Alina's teeth no longer have a cross-bite.
(May 2015) There is still some minor crowding with her bottom teeth, but considering that there are 4 adult teeth where there were previously smaller baby teeth with no space whatsoever, you can tell that her bottom jaw has also expanded.