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The Number ONE Reason
How do teeth move?
Information About Aligner Chewies
It’s very important to seat your aligners correctly. The best way to seat aligners are with Aligner Chewies. Using Aligner Chewies is easy you simply insert your aligners and then bite down on the Aligner Chewie starting at the back teeth and working their way all around the dental arch. Do this for a few minutes 3 times a day especially in he first few days after changing aligners.
Use gentle force to ease the aligner into place, do not use excessive force as the aligner may be damaged.
Seat your Aligners
Teeth not straightening as planned or not at all ?
Straight Facts for Patients
Troubleshooting Truline Aligners
If you do not wear your aligners as prescribed it is unlikely your teeth will move at all.
100% Compliance
Means 22.5 hours per day everyday
You get 1.5 hours off for meals
This is very important to know, because if you know this you will understand why it’s important to wear your aligners as prescribed. Simply put, teeth move in direct response to force applied to them. Your aligners are applying a force to your teeth in a special way, and mostly you will not feel it but they are.This works at a cellular level and the main cells involved are called OSTEOCLASTS and OSTEOBLASTS. This process takes a few days to start but only takes a very short time to stop.
Fig A Shows a tooth in its bony socket connect by fibres called the periodontal ligament.
Fig B Shows a force on the tooth and the periodontal ligament stretched on the side of the force and compressed on the opposite side.
Fig C Shows Osteoclasts removing bone on the side of the force and osteoblasts depositing bone on the opposite side of the force.
Fig D Represents bodily tooth movement
It is important to note that this process can take 72 hours or more to begin after a force is applied but may stop just after 4 hours after the force is removed. It make take a long time to begin again.
If this ‘on - off’ cycle continues it's unlikely your teeth will move at all.
This is why continual aligner wear is so important.
Dont Race Ahead
Not wearing each aligner for the correct length of time will end in certain disaster. Why? Teeth can only move a certain amount in a certain time frame..they cannot move faster. Scientific studies show that even in the best case scenarios about 1mm per month is about theabsolute maximum movement per month. Also depending on age of patient, bone type, the type of movement required such as rotation or tipping and other factors movement time varies significantly. Aligners generally move teeth slowly about 0.5-0.7 mm per month. Everyone is different and this may be actually be less depending on individual circumstances.
You may also need to wear each aligner longer, we recommend 2 weeks each aligner, but 3-4 weeks each aligner may be necessary.
It is important not to 'race ahead' and go to the
next aligner ahead of the prescribed time.
Even if your aligner “feels loose” it is still working..in fact it’s a sign it’s working very well. Amazingly teeth need very little force to move!
Loosening Contact Areas
Your Doctor will probably want to loosen your “contact areas” of your teeth periodically, this is part of treatment. Do not be alarmed this is not going to damage your teeth. This is a routine procedure where the areas your teeth intersect are cleaned and a very small amount of tooth is removed, usually only 100 microns and that’s about the thickness of a strand of hair. Sometimes it may be slightly more but your Doctor will advise you more about this and when it will be needed.
Loosening contacts or IPR is safe and scientifically proven to do no damage to your teeth. Often small fine diamond impregnated files are used.
What else could be wrong?
In some rarer circumstances other factors may effect tooth movement, or lack there of. Consult your dental practitioner for more information on these possible situations.
Remenber, just wearing more new aligners to fix an underlying issue will rarely resolve it.