Overbite Correction

Dental overbite correction without surgery is one of the most common reasons patients come to our Orthodontic team, or in plain English – to reduce the amount their front teeth stick out! There are many reasons to do this.

Fixing an overbite can:

• Reduce problems with eating and speaking by moving the teeth to the correct position.
• Reduce the risk of injuring the teeth (especially in children and sportspeople)
• Reduce overcrowding and align crooked teeth; looking good feels great.
• Help avoid tooth decay, long-term gum disease and tooth loss by making brushing more effective.
• Sometimes removes jaw pain, although this might be caused by types of malocclusion and bite problems.

Before And After

Luckily, here at Winning Smiles, we have plenty of ways of treating big overbites (and reversed overbites….but maybe that’s one for another day!).

As with everything we do, it’s all pretty logical; if you want to reduce an overbite, we can either move the top teeth backwards, or move the bottom teeth forwards, or, as in most cases, a bit of both.

Methods For Reducing Overbite

There are a number of sophisticated treatment options to help reduce an untreated overbite:

• Composite bonding and overlay treatment for minor overbite and misaligned teeth
• Functional appliances, including the cutting-edge ALF appliance, for proper alignment
• Fixed Damon braces, proven to move teeth far quicker than traditional lower-cost braces
• Invisalign, clear teeth aligners, help align the jaw and solve a bad bite.
• Traditional braces can sometimes be a longer-term additional treatment.

Moving The Top Teeth

As with everything we do, it’s all pretty logical. If you want to reduce an overbite, we can move the top teeth backwards, the bottom teeth forward, or, in most cases, a bit of both.

To move the top teeth backwards, we normally use a combination of expanding the top jaw width ways whilst using rubber bands to pull the top teeth backwards, which eases crowded teeth.

This tends to give great, broad, aesthetic smiles whilst treating the overbite.

Some dentists will frequently ask you to have 2 top adult teeth taken out to reduce a big overbite so that they can pull all of the front teeth backwards. We’re pleased to say that this is something we very rarely do at Winning Smiles.

We try to keep healthy teeth wherever we can, and 90% of our treatments are completed without extractions.

There are also techniques we use to try and help the lower jaw slide forwards and, in doing so, move the front teeth forward.

We can do this with functional appliances in younger patients, such as a type of brace that uses your growth to help correct an overbite. We can also use fixed braces with elastic to help move the lower teeth.

What We Don’t Do

• To fix overbites, we try to avoid extraction at all costs.
• Corrective jaw surgery, orthognathic surgery or surgical procedures for a skeletal overbite, we are not plastic surgeons.

Depending on the severity of the overbite, it can be corrected in weeks, with prices from £1,200.