Dr. Kammo on Expanders
Expanders are appliances that help make the jaw larger and expanders are very important. So a lot of people don’t know the time to see your kid at the orthodontist office is around seven years old and this helps us get a good look of the child’s development. With expanders, it helps widen the upper jaw to create space for the future adult teeth that grow in at a later stage such as 11 and 12.
The importance of an expander is not just for creating space for adult but it also allows for airway to increase. That helps the child develop more properly. When you expand the upper jaw, the nose also opens up on the inside to create for a better flow of air.
When you come into Profound Orthodontics, I like to place the expander for each patient. We then teach the parent how to turn the expander and when you turn the expander, the expander opens up little by little. It’s a very easy process.
We like to have them do it once a day and then after they get their expander on, usually they go into a limited set of braces to finish up their phase one. All our patients at Profound Orthodontics get proper oral hygiene instructions for their expanders and proper instructions on how to keep their expander in good health. What we do is we send them patients home with, you know, a protocol.
We teach each patient what to do to maintain the proper standards of each expander.
- Stop alignment problems early
- Widen your child’s airway
- Promote better sleep quality
