Huge open bite mostly fixed without surgery

[bigopenbite]

Yah they are reluctant because if it doesn't work, some patients get upset and want their money back, sue, complain etc. And the surgery is more predictable. Most adults would refuse headgear. Glad you found someone, I t took me 10 years to find someone. I can confirm the 1000% part on the compliance, headgear did nothing for me until I was wearing it over 20hrs/day. I am down to 8hrs/day now just to hold things wear they are. Openbites are highly prone to relapse. I may need to even wear the headgear a few nights a week even when I get retainers, but we'll see. Still better then surgery though which can also relapse. Although rare my Ortho has had a few surgery openbite paitents over the years that had to have surgery twice due to relapse.

[js6js6]

As a fellow open-biter (though less severe) this thread piqued my interest. Glad you were able to find something that worked for you to avoid surgery! I’m not back in braces yet, but reading your story definitely gives me confidence that there’s a solution for everyone out there.

Any updates on your treatment? Curious to hear how things are going now that we’re about a year past you moving to nights only.

[bigopenbite]

Hi, I got my braces off in January(4yrs), and I have had no relapse since. My Ortho gave me a fixed lower and upper and lower Hawley. The upper Hawley has a posterior bite block and headgear tubes. I wear the headgear one night a week just to be safe. The posterior intrusion with HPHG worked so well that I actually developed a small posterior openbite for a while, the Ortho fixed that by clipping the arch wire to the 7's and progressively reducing headgear wear. I have full occlussion now with about 1mm of positive overbite.

Unfortunately I am still a little class 3 unrelated to the success of the intrusion. I was slightly class 3 before braces as well but It wasn't noticable due to the 7mm anterior openbite.

Overall I am very happy with my bite compared to how terrible it was before, but I think I perhaps should not have have let the Ortho talk me into accepting the class 3 issue as it causes me some minor TMJ discomfort if I hold my mandible retracted behind my maxillary teeth to long.

If you have any further questions ask away.