Anyone wore distal jet before?

[gracehcc]

My lower teeth only have one molar on each side, so the ortho suggested me to have distal jet on the phase 1 treatment, that means he is going to put the distal jet on my lower teeth and move both molar closed to the front and then I need to learn how to adjust the appliance sometime for 4 months. I need your experience & suggestion while wearing that thing.
Thanks a lot!

[sportsgrl97]

you sure its not for moving the molars back... because distal means away from the midline so it would be pushing them towards the back of your mouth. just wondering?

michelle

[gracehcc]

Hi Meryaten,

I was misunderstanding about my situation! You were right! I got my distal jet appliance last Thursday and ortho put that to my upper teeth in order to move my molar backward so I can get the space for brace on in the future. Right now I have speech problem and trying to get use to it because I just start my new job as a customer service for an international express company since 6/11. Thanks God, I'm still under training period, so I don't have to talk too much during a day.
By the way, I would like to know the "expender" other people are talking about is the same as "distal jet", right?

Thanks for your reply!!

Grace

Hi, Grace. And welcome!



Got to admit, I'm a little confused by your post - I had thought the distal jet appliance was to push teeth backward (distalise them) in the mouth, not forward. Plus, every image I've ever seen for a distal jet is of an appliance used on the upper arch not the lower.


http://aonet.americanortho.com/productp ... egoryid=12

If it's what I think it is, then in terms of coping with it, I think you'll share a lot of issues with those people who have expanders or Nance buttons. Speaking may be an issue at first - best answer to that is plenty of practice. And your mouth (particularly the tongue) will likely be sore - best think you can do for that is simply to stay very well hydrated, as this helps all the tissues of the mouth better to cope with the strange hardware that you're imposing on them. Cleanup may be a minor issue too - definitely a Waterpik could be of help there, but you should also do a search on these forums (see the "search" button above all the posts?) to see how inventive people have been to clean under their Nance buttons.

Hope that's some help at least.

[Lisa65]

Hi Grace
Glad you cleared up the distal jet query and hope you get used to it soon.

Expanders do a different job to a distal jet. There are different types of expander. An RPE (rapid palatal expander) and a quad-helix are the two that spring to mind.

Expanders will expand/widen a narrow dental arch making more room for the teeth.

If you want more details about expanders then a search of this site will turn up several posts. There are quite a few members here who have or have had expanders.[/i]