Teeth Grinding Relief in Long Beach, CA

Are you grinding your teeth without knowing it?

Many people clench or grind their teeth without realizing it – both while they’re awake and while they’re asleep. However, your teeth should only be touching while you chew and momentarily when you swallow. If you find they are touching at other times, you are clenching!

Over the years, Dr. Andrew R. Jung, DDS, has helped many patients overcome the painful symptoms of teeth grinding, or bruxism, with an FDA-approved, non-surgical dental device known as an occlusal guard. The guard is designed to protect your teeth and offer rapid relief from the painful symptoms of teeth grinding.

How to Tell if You Have Bruxism

Chronic grinding and clenching can cause painful symptoms. Left untreated, it can also cause your teeth to wear down at a rapid rate. If you aren’t sure if you are grinding your teeth, here are some symptoms to look for:

• Chronic headaches
• Sore jaw muscles or sore teeth, especially in the morning
• Teeth that look or feel like they’re wearing down 
• Teeth that are more sensitive to heat, cold, or sweets
• Sores on the inside of your cheek from chewing
• Trouble sleeping

How Bruxism Affects Your Oral Health

Constant grinding and clenching of teeth is often caused by a misaligned dental bite. This causes you to place more force on one side of your mouth than the other. When this occurs, you do not bite down evenly on all teeth. This is an unnatural movement that causes abnormal wear and pressure on your teeth, and puts constant force on the jaw joint, which leads to head and neck pain. Worse yet, the excess force placed on your teeth by grinding and clenching wears them down at a very rapid rate.

Grinding and clenching can also lead to tooth sensitivity. This is because when your teeth experience more bite pressure, the internal pulp (nerves and blood vessels of the tooth) becomes irritated and inflamed, leading to tooth sensitivity.

The Benefits of Using an Occlusal Guard

“Occlusal” is a term that refers to the position of your teeth when you bite down. An occlusal guard is a simple, non-surgical device we use to help eliminate the damaging effects of teeth grinding and protect your teeth from wear and tear. It looks like a mouth guard and works by blocking contact of your upper and lower teeth. 

This custom-made device gently realigns the jaw and/or improves the bite and takes stress off the joint, providing pain relief by allowing the jaw to relax into a natural position during sleep.

An occlusal guard is an excellent choice for those who experience mild bruxism. However, severe cases are usually treated with full mouth rehabilitation. This usually involves repairing worn-down teeth, which results in a healthier smile and prevents further damage to your teeth by eliminating your clenching or grinding habit.

Effective, Personalized Treatment

At our Long Beach, CA dental office, we stress the importance of developing long-term patient relationships to provide the treatment that fits your needs and promotes good oral health. We want you to get to know us so that you will always feel comfortable and confident when visiting our office.

Please contact our office, and a friendly member of our team will be happy to arrange a consultation. At that time, we can address your concerns and work with you to develop a customized treatment plan.