Hooray For Airway Palooza!

People with properly developed faces will always have straight teeth, room for wisdom teeth, and superior beauty. Sadly, most of us have some level of crowding and lack of jaw space for wisdom teeth today, meaning almost all of us to have deficient jaws. Since most of us have underdeveloped faces, this epidemic has gone primarily unnoticed by us, including most physicians and dentists. This needs to change because it is one of the major contributing factors to many, if not most, of our modern health problems; most of which originate in poor breathing from small airways.

I am writing this post as I fly back home from an amazing conference called Airway Palooza. I want to share some pearls of wisdom that can help you recognize if you have an airway problem and ways it can be addressed.

PaleoFx Presentation: The Shrinking Face Epidemic

This is the presentation I am giving today at PaleoFx in Austin Texas.

The Class IV Malocclusion

I had written about how teeth are supposed to fit together on February 10th, 2020. The three classifications dentists use are classes I, II, and III. My colleague Dr. Kevin Boyd has proposed adding a class IV classification. Most orthodontic cases today should be classified in this new way. Because it involves both the upper and lower jaws being too small, breathing is often compromised in patients with it. With poor breathing, especially at night, comes a host of other physical ailments. Read on to find out how your dentist can recognize and treat this condition.

Is Tooth Wear Good For Us?

Tooth wear is considered a bad thing in the modern era. It can be painful and unsightly. Furthermore, a 2019 analysis of 706 studies involving tooth wear associated it with sleep disorders, oro-facial pain, oral dryness, GERD, and sleep bruxism (tooth grinding). However, several lines of research conclude that tooth wear, even in childhood, may be an evolutionary survival strategy. Especially as it pertains to proper jaw growth. The story is a little complicated, so I want to give you a little background and then explain how tooth wear may have been beneficial during our evolution.

My Face Fix So Far

I have written numerous posts on the plight of our small jaws over the years. So I thought it might be a good idea to share the story of mine, and what I have done about it. Maternal smoking, lack of breastfeeding, soft food, swollen tonsils, sinus problems, a deviated septum, and attractive orthodontics all played a role. The good news I was able to correct every problem. I will tell you how at the end of this post.