The best accessory to a beautiful outfit is a smile, making them one of the first things people notice when they meet us. While looks are important, keeping our teeth happy and healthy is important to our overall health. This is why oral maxillofacial surgeon, Dr. Mark Stein, joined Inside South Florida to share why having gorgeous teeth has become more important.
“What we're seeing is over the last several years, people are obviously affected by the pandemic through anxiety and stress and a lot of that is really coming out,” says Dr. Stein. “During the night when people are clenching their teeth; People who have traditionally clenched, and grind are doing so much more often these days because of all the anxieties that they're facing and because of that, they're breaking teeth.”
The clenching and grinding of teeth, while someone sleeps, is categorized as what are called parafunctional habits, habits that we are not able to control because they're done in our sleep.
“Over the years, we've developed techniques in how to try to mitigate the effects of the clenching and grinding. Because it's a habit, it's very difficult to break that habit,” says Dr. Stein. “So, over the years, we've developed techniques using Botox. People are familiar with Botox for cosmetic reasons. People are always talking about getting Botox injections to reduce lines, wrinkles, and frown lines, but Botox has other possibilities for treatment, and one of them is an injection of Botox into the jaw muscles.”
He explains that by injecting a controlled amount of Botox into a specific area of this jaw muscle, what it does is weaken the muscle, paralyzing portions of the muscle, so that when that patient is clenching and grinding at night, they're doing it with much less force.
For more information visit their website NYOralSurg.com
This Inside South Florida segment is paid for by IBH MEDIA
