Every Dentist Needs Your Help Keeping Your Teeth Healthy

Discovering a bony lump under your gums can be nerve-wracking, even though in most cases they're completely harmless. Even so, many people are troubled by their presence and want them gone. If you feel this way, here's how braces can help to get you there.

Bony Lumps

The bony lumps aren't actually as uncommon as you might think, and they even have a proper name: torus. These tori are benign growths of excessive amounts of bone cells in your jaw. They tend to develop when your jaw has been under too much pressure and stress in one particular area.

The reason this happens is that when you apply natural amounts of pressure to your jaw through eating and chewing, a process occurs where the jaw grows new bone cells to keep your jaw strong and healthy to tolerate the pressure. However, the process is based on how much pressure you apply. Too little, and too few bone cells will be created, which typically only happens if you're missing teeth. Too much, and you have an excessive amount of new bone mass, and they form as tori.

How Braces Help

Braces can help you to get rid of your existing tori and to prevent new ones from forming by reducing the amount of stress and pressure you're applying on your jaw. Many people tend to grind their teeth and grit them together too hard because their teeth are out of alignment or the jaw itself is out of alignment. When you fix these problems, it's much easier for the jaw to rest flat and easily against itself. This means you won't be grinding your teeth as much, which will help to stop the tori from getting any bigger.

What to Expect

If you're interested in getting braces for this problem, your first step is to talk to an orthodontist. You should explain to them that you're not only interested in having your teeth straightened but that you're concerned about the torus or tori growing in your mouth.

Your orthodontist will assess your teeth, jaw, and tori. They may take x-rays to find out exactly how large the tori are. If they feel that they take pressure off the tori by correcting the alignment of your teeth, you can begin treatment immediately.

Over time, your tori will gradually shrink. Without enough pressure to encourage them to stay large, they'll begin to lose the older bone cells and will become smaller as a result. Tori can be irritating to have, especially if they're getting in the way of eating or talking. If you're tired of having these bony growths, talk to an orthodontic office like Orthodontic  Smilemaker to get started with treatment.