Maple Dental Hygiene Care

03/22/2024

Thank full to my family for all their support as I worked hard to achieve another milestone in my professional life .💙

08/24/2022

09/27/2021

When you support your posture your blood flow, breathing, and fascial tissues all sit in correct balance.

So the question is, what is CORRECT posture?

I’ve had both a personal and professional journey into understanding posture.

They happened somewhat at the same time.

As I began to see how posture issues show up in the mouth, I began to see the same patterns in patients.

Forward heads, open mouths, and yep, low tongues…

So what did it all mean?

As I sat there thinking about it all, I realized I was:

1) Slouching
2) Mouth breathing
3) Leaning to one side.

The first thing I learnt was that tongue posture provides support for the cervical posture, but guidance for the spine to stand tall.

Correct oral posture isn’t jaws clenched and teeth together, it’s tongue sealed to the roof of the mouth, lips, closed, yet relaxed, and teeth slightly apart. When you do this your tongue muscles support the airway behind your throat and also the vertebrae of your neck.

We’ve talked a bit about this so I won’t go into further detail here, but it takes a lot of work to get this right.

Ok, the rest of the spine:

First: A Common myth

Good posture is pulling your shoulders back.

Actually good posture is relaxing the shoulders so the trapezius muscle relaxes (tight shoulders? Yep if you constantly hold your shoulders back it turns that big muscle on).

INSTEAD TRY TO:

Lift your sternum up from your belly button

1) Put your finger in the centre of your chest about 3 finger tips below your ni***es
2) Focus on PULLING THIS up, which brings the sternum up tall and elongate the torso until you feel it in the middle of your back between your shoulder blades.
3) If you feel it in your lower back and your ribs are poking out, you’ve hyperextended. Remember alignment—your ribs should still be underneath the breast.
4) Keep the tongue sealed to roof of the mouth

You should now feel your entire mid spine, and cervical spine being up and supported, your shoulders relaxed, and your feeling roughly 2 inches taller.

There are other aspects like hips etc.. But posture is incredibly important, so work on it!

Do you get neck, or shoulder pain? Is it posture related?

09/03/2021

Personally, neck and head movement and mobility has been critical to maintaining better back and spinal posture.

If you look at the picture you see that each tooth has a personal drainage system.

The lymphatic system functions to drain tissue fluid, plasma proteins and other cellular debris back into the blood stream, and is also involved in immune defence. Once this collection of substances enters the lymphatic vessels, it is known as lymph.

To summarise, the lymph nodes of the head and neck can be divided into two groups; a superficial ring of lymph nodes, and a vertical group of deep lymph nodes.

The deep (cervical) lymph nodes receive all of the lymph from the head and neck. They are organised into a vertical chain, located within close proximity to the internal jugular vein within the carotid sheath.

The lymphatic system depends on this changing pressure to pump lymphatic fluid through the system with valves that keep fluids moving in one direction. The flow through these nodes is what drives our capacity to both mount an immune response and to sound the alarm for other needed immune cells.

Any sort of movement practice (gentle or vigorous) can act as an important pump for this system.

For two beginner twisting exercises try these two at home:
• Standing twist.
1. Stand straight feet hip width apart
2. Start turning to one side
3. Place one hand behind back and one on the opposite hip.
4. Look as far over your shoulder as you can exhale and inhale
5. Inhale one more time and as your exhale twist and repeat to the other side.
6. Repeat 10 times.

• Sitting Twist:
1. Sit up straight with both legs out in front of you.
2. Cross your right foot to the outside of your left thigh and bring your left foot back beside your right hip. Place your right fingertips behind you and hug your left knee into your chest. Inhale, sit up tall. Exhale, twist to the right from the base of your spine.
3. To increase the intensity of the pose, bring your left elbow to outside of your right knee. Inhale, lengthen your spine. Exhale, twist a little deeper.
4. Hold the pose for 3 breaths on each side.

Do you ever feel your lymph nodes swell up?

08/27/2021

Your tongue acts as a rudder and support system through a fascial line that runs right down to your toes!

In nearly all my patients, I see poor tongue posture, and the links to bad spinal posture, breathing, and other issues are felt right throughout the body.

The simplest way we can see how the tongue is so influential is how it supports proper head posture. When the tongue is down and forward, forward head posture and mouth breathing occurs.

Over time this associates with a narrow jaw, crooked teeth, and sleep disorders.

But… you guessed it, as always the mouth is a gateway for so many other systems in the body.

The tongue is an extremely complex muscular and fascial rudder system. This dissection via shows the deep front lines fascial connection.

It guides all the structures of the myofascial continuity that runs from the inner arch of the foot all the way up through the middle of the body to the tongue and jaw muscles.

Isn’t that amazing?

Actually the tongue is potentially more important for core stability than turning on your actual core.

Our core begins deep under the arch with the insertions of the tendons from the lower leg, especially tibialis posterior.

To find its insertion, feel just under the inside arch of the foot, just underneath and forward of protrusion of the navicular bone you can feel a bit over an inch in front of your tibial malleolus on the inside of your ankle.

This point will respond to a soft-but-energy-rich touch that is held, and also to a more firm and direct fascial release. Pressing here can make a flow of feeling run up the fascial line.
So for better core support, spinal, hip and leg strength, you need to work on your tongue posture.

During exercise practice sealing the tongue to the roof of the mouth, this turns on the fascial rudder to the toes. It takes time and you need to work on making the BACK of the tongue connect to the soft palate. More on this to come.

Have you noticed jaw or hip issues?

08/26/2021

Adderall is a commonly prescribed drug for kids with ADHD. It contains four salts of amphetamine, a stimulant.

In the 1980s and 1990s, the most popular treatments were stimulants that acted only for four to six hours. Most kids now are taking ones that last 12 hours.

Over the past two decades, parents and teachers have reported epidemic levels of children with trouble focusing, impulsive behavior and so much energy that they are bouncing off walls. Educators, policymakers and scientists have referred to attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, as a national crisis and have spent billions of dollars looking into its cause.

What is interesting, is that the medical literature has been showing a very strong connection between kids diagnosed with ADHD, and underlying sleep issues.

Are they just tired?

What if, as a growing number of researchers are proposing, many kids today simply aren't getting the sleep they need, leading to challenging behaviors that mimic ADHD?
Sleep disorders often mimic ADHD symptoms, causing inattentiveness and restlessness in people who don’t have ADHD. At the same time, sleep disorders can exacerbate symptoms in people who do have ADHD.

Growing evidence suggests that a segment of children with ADHD are misdiagnosed and actually suffer from insufficient sleep, insomnia, obstructed breathing or another known sleep disorder.

But the most paradigm-challenging idea may be that ADHD may itself be a sleep disorder. If correct, this idea could fundamentally change the way ADHD is studied and treated.

75% of people with ADHD have sleep disturbances and that the less sleep they get the more severe the symptoms. In one paper, scientists showed that a group of children with nighttime breathing issues who were diagnosed with ADHD no longer met the diagnostic criteria for the disorder after they had their adenoids or tonsils removed to treat the sleep problem.

That means if kids snore, and have symptoms of ADHD, you need to investigate their breathing at night.

This includes development of the dental arch which supports the airway at night and tendencies to mouth breathe.

Don’t ignore kids who don’t sleep well.

Do you or a family member suffer from these issues?

08/18/2021

It’s rare that a cavity just happens out of nowhere.

Think about it, tooth enamel is the hardest tissue in your body.

When a patient walks into my office, they generally have a ‘feeling’ that they have cavities.

Why is this? Well instead of being a purely bacterial disease, tooth decay will highly likely be considered to be an endocrine disorder.

Let’s explore why.

Chronic stress and sleep deprivation is known to link to hormonal imbalances.

A recent small study demonstrated that people with a high amount of cavities (DMFT around 10) had significantly lower levels of melatonin in the saliva. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8342951/

This should open the door to explore the endocrine influence of melatonin on tooth decay.

Why does this matter? Well, bacteria and hormones are linked, and instead of purely thinking about the microbes, perhaps we should be thinking about how the hormones help balance teeth.

When you sleep, melatonin floods the body, including the saliva and bone marrow, to tell the bones to remineralize.

Melatonin is a highly lipophilic molecule that combats oxidative stress and could potentially inhibit the progression of dental caries.

It is one of the most potent antioxidants, and the inflammatory stress of tooth decay could be due to a lack of nocturnal management of oxidative stress.

Also, bones aren’t static, it’s extremely limited to think of hard tissues as, static.

Bones and teeth are living breathing entities of our body. We think of them as a ‘dead’ rock-like structure, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

Bones have a living communication center, that is sensing the body, and reacting to the environment.

Osteocytes live inside the bone matrix. They are the ‘master’ cells that signal the builders when it’s time to build or tear down the bone structure.

Bone cells are ‘looking’ at pressures through the bones through their eyes. Bone cells ‘see’ pressures in the bone and fluid movement through the calcium matrix. When they sense these pressures, they begin to prepare to make bone in the areas where fluids are flowing more often. It’s how bones remodel to pressure.

They are also governed by endocrine hormones like testosterone and estrogen.

So in reality, the skeletal system is a living, breathing, sleeping, balance of material, fluid, and crystalline structure flowing between different states. It is connected to every cell in the body and bends when we need them to bend.

To protect your teeth, you need deep restful sleep.

Ok, let’s get some real-world anecdotes in the comments.

Have you noticed a link between low sleep and cavities?

08/14/2021

Chronic teeth grinding, called bruxism, affects up to 1 in 3 people!

Many people are unaware they grind their teeth yet suffer from chronic migraines, TMJ issues, neck, and back pain.

Patients who teeth grind often present with a similar set of symptoms.

These include:
•Poor sleep
• Digestive issues
• Fatigue
• Headaches and migraines
• Cold hands and feet
• Depression or anxiety

Teeth grinding at night is associated with an airway issue and an undiagnosed sleep disorder.

Tension in the jaw is created by the brain pulling the tongue out of the airway to open up volume in the airway.

The syndrome is called Upper Airway Resistance Syndrome.

A functional dental exam can discover what exactly is causing this issue (high narrow palate, swollen adenoids and tonsils, or low tongue posture for example).

One remedy that helps most people is to strengthen your tongue posture.

Teeth grinding disturbs the cranial nerve communication to the jaw. Muscles of chewing, which are activated by the Trigeminal nerve are activated.

However, if your postural tongue muscles are activated, the Hypoglossal nerve is activated.

Proper tongue posture prevents you from clenching your teeth during the day, which hinders the communication between your Trigeminal nerve and your brain.

I always tell patients that we need to strengthen our tongue muscles.

Here’s an exercise to help relieve teeth grinding and strengthen your tongue. It’s a great hypoglossal and vagus nerve activator too.

1) Keep your tongue pressed against the roof of your palate when your mouth is closed.
2) Your teeth should be slightly apart and jaw relaxed (this is resting posture)
3) Swallow sealing the tongue to the roof of the mouth
4) Without removing the tongue from the top of your mouth, swallow again
5) Repeat 10x (or build up as many as you can).

You should feel a deep strain in your neck. That’s the deep postural tongue muscles, that should be actively holding your neck open when you sleep.

You need to support your airway!

Could you do the exercise? Have you noticed teeth grinding?

08/04/2021

Headaches, jaw pain, and neck pain stop your nervous system from optimal performance.

Don't ignore pain.

Personally while practicing dentistry, I’ve found forward head posture to be a huge issue for my neck and back.

It’s reinforced to me that skeletal posture begins in the mouth. The central rudder of your posture tongue to the roof of the mouth brings forth a wave of unconscious support positions for the neck and spine.

While posture muscles are out of our conscious control, the ‘rudder’ of your posture is your tongue. The tongue’s central connection to the roof of the mouth, drawing up and back to the throat, turns on all of the neck muscles.
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These muscles act like a ‘sling’ for the airway, during swallowing they widen the palate.

They respond to orders from the brain based on signals sent by your senses.

Ask someone with slouched shoulders to pull them back. Their body will return to the misaligned posture as soon as they stop thinking about it.

We must learn to strengthen spinal support, in key areas like the tongue, neck, and upper back. Strength training helps because you improve your nervous system’s connections.

However, when our posture is unsupported, we must fix faulty signals coming from your body’s primary sensors, and can be picked up throughout the body.

Signs may be:

- Chronic jaw clenching
- Headaches and vertigo
- Dysfunctional eye movements
- Tilted hip posture
- Fallen arches in the feet

Tongue to the roof of the mouth (the back part of the mouth), nasal breathing, straight cervical spine (back of head flat against a wall) and shoulders back is the way we need to support our spine and precious brain.

By doing this we support our cranial nerves and allow the nervous system to work pain free.

To feel correct tongue posture, try the following exercise.

Strengthening tongue posture means the BACK of the tongue. That's right at the back of the throat, where your tongue should seal out your soft palate in normal posture & swallowing.

Normal posture is tongue sealed in this position, teeth slightly apart and jaw muscles relaxed.

Feel strange? Then you need to practice.

Do you suffer from neck or back pain? Have you noticed any other sign elsewhere in the body?

07/28/2021

Stopping mouthbreathing is probably one of the simplest and most powerful health practices you can perform for yourself.

Just a warning, it’s not easy to. For very few, consciously reverting back to nasal breathing is a quick fix, but for most, our body’s are used to this survival mechanism.

Personally, I found there are a number of steps to reverting mouthbreathing (this will vary wildly, but to start to give you an idea):

Step 1: •Identification: [You are currently doing this step by reading this post] – here we are learning and appreciating how your respiratory system works. The mouth is for food, and the nose is for air, it’s that simple. Once you consciously turn this switch it’s a big step forward.

Step 2: • Small steps: You take 25 000 breaths a day. So while you may not fix all of them at once, you can aim to start fixing a small amount of them. Realize that this life-long practice, that you’re going to shift slowly. *as an aside, if we teach kids to do this from an early age it NEVER becomes an issue. You just breathe through your nose, because it’s normal.

Step 3: • Diagnoses: Here’s a hard one and you probably need professional help here. There can be many barriers to nasal breathing. It can stem from a high narrow dental arch, which constricts the nasal sinus. Deviated septum, or inflamed turbinates, or inflamed adenoids and tonsils. Low tongue posture, and open lip posture can contribute to oral breathing. There is a primary barrier to nasal breathing and you need to know your phenotype, if you encounter barriers, treatment may assist.

Step 4:
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• Persistence, feedback, and adjustment: Start with day time exercises. Sitting quietly, closed lip breathing, slowing the breath, be comfortable with extended periods. Start to increase you CO2 capacity and your brain’s resilience to this slower, deeper breathing. It will take time, and you will feel ‘panicky’ at the start.

Remember, it’s a journey, and the first thing you need to do is to start building a daily practice.

Do you or family members struggle with mouth breathing? Any further tips to share?