Top 3 reasons why you should spend more money on a night guard from your dentist office rather than the ones from the drugstore (or Amazon) that are so much cheaper.
You can either watch this video or read the blog post below : )
David asks Liz - Hey, Liz. I was with a patient the other day and they were asking me why they should get their night guard from us and not just get one of the do-it-yourself ones from like a pharmacy or convenience store. Is there any way you could help me answer that?
Liz answers:
That's a really good question. So, there are a couple big differences between the night guards that you do over the counter yourself and verse the ones that we make in the office. For one, the night guard that you get over the counter, you don't really know where that material is coming from. So, we don't really know what's in it. It could have BPAs, it could have latex. When we make your night guard (or what they call an accusal guard) is made with material that is BPA free and latex free. It's medical grade and highly tested and regulated to ensure that that stuff is not leeching into your system. Because you have to remember when you're wearing this night guard, you are wearing it for about eight hours a day when you're sleeping.
So you have that in your mouth and over time things can kind of leech out in there and cause problems not just for your dental health but your medical health. So we always want to make sure that we're putting your health as the main priority.
Another reason for a professional guard is, the cheaper option being the over-the-counter night guard that you make by putting it in water and boiling it so you can form it to your teeth, still has movement. It's not perfect. There's still going to be areas that aren't protected properly or it could be too large for your mouth or too small. So, when we make them in theoffice, what we do is we take a scan of your mouth or impressions. And with that scanner impressions, we end up using a vacuum seal to put the material onto a model that matches your teeth perfectly. And then when it goes into your mouth, it is a custom fit directly for you. Um, and with that, it helps to protect the teeth better so that the enamel doesn't break down. With the material differences, ours is what's called dual laminate, which that means that there is a soft cushiony part on the inside of that, which sits against the teeth, and on the outside, it tends to be a harder material to protect against that force when you're clenching or grinding your teeth.
And then lastly, one of the other things is that with the over-the-counter night guard, they just don't last as long. They tend to over time break down or you can grind through them very easily. And because ours are made out of a higher grade material and um they're custom fit for you, they do tend to last a longer. So that's the big key reasons why. But again, overall, it's comes down to, at least for me, the fact that you're putting something in that was custom fit for you and that doesn't have things that are going to affect your health, such as BPAs and latex if you have allergies, um, in your system for eight hours every night. Thank you.
David says - That's exactly what I needed. Thanks!
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