What do you do if sleep apnea is causing daytime fatigue or when the mouth is small to fit the emerging molar teeth? Dr. John Freeman, an experienced dentist, recommends oral surgery to improve these issues and ease temporomandibular joint pain. Your dentist will diagnose and treat different oral issues and recommend an oral and mandibular surgeon who deals with issues such as an impacted tooth, dental implants, oral cancer, and oral cosmetic surgeries. These procedures will improve the dental formula, improve oral health and restore function.
Impacted Teeth
Impacted teeth have less room in the mouth leading to crookedness and misalignment. They lead to bacterial growth between the teeth leading to cavities, gum disease, and gingivitis. The molars which grow later in life might not have enough room in the mouth leading to teeth crookedness. The dentists will use an X-ray to image the teeth on the arch and determine if the molars are lying across the jaw. The molars which are not upright will exert pressure on the teeth leading to crookedness.
Dental Implants
You would need oral surgery when getting dental implants as they fix lost teeth. Your dentists would save your teeth if you got involved in an accident to avoid teeth loss. However, if the teeth are loose due to exposed roots, you may need to extract them and artificial implant teeth. The dentist will cut through the gums through an invasive procedure that involves drilling into the roots and jaw bone. They will fit the artificial root and the artificial tooth, which looks like the other teeth on the arch.
Soft Tissue Grafts
You will need oral surgery to fix gingivitis, as the issue leads to enlarged pockets between the gums and the teeth. The dentist will use soft tissue grafts from the mouth roof to fix the exposed roots. Another oral surgery can correct sleep apnea which results from the collapsing of the muscles at the back of the mouth leading to the blockage of the airways. Sleep apnea results in poor oxygen intake, making it impossible to sleep throughout the night. You might wake up occasionally to gasp for air, leading to interrupted sleep, fatigue, and tiredness during the day.
They Treat Congenital Issues
Congenital issues such as cleft palate might lead to self-awareness, and you would need surgery to correct the issues. The oral surgeon will use tissue grafts from other body parts to correct the cleft palate. Cleft palate is a cosmetic procedure that may improve your speech and chew.
They Correct Jaw Deformities
Sometimes you might have deformities that affect how you chew food making it hard to achieve a healthy diet. Jaw deformities lead to an underbite or overbite, leading to poor nutrition and improper speech. Thus the oral surgeon corrects and aligns the jaws leading to better alignment.
Oral surgery might be scary as it could be invasive, but they improve your oral health. You may opt for oral surgery to correct issues such as sleep apnea and pockets between the teeth and gums resulting from gingivitis. The surgeon takes the soft tissues from the mouth’s upper side and uses them to correct the exposed teeth and remove the excess tissues to cure sleep apnea. Moreover, they alleviate impacted teeth and jaw deformities and fix lost teeth with dental implants.
