Success Comes From Within
Sucking for a newborn is an instinct. It's how they get their food and is comforting to them. Sucking habits are recommended to stop prior to the age of 3, before the adult teeth start to come in. Once it persists beyond the age of 3, or becomes chronic (occurring in more than one setting) it may be time to think about eliminating the sucking habit.
Before making any decisions, it is important for you to be knowledgeable about the treatment options.
There are many different treatment approaches available to eliminate a sucking habit. Psychodynamic therapy, mechanical devices, and behavior modification therapies are common approaches. However, the data clearly supports the use of behavior modification being the most successful.
A Two Thumbs Up therapy program encompasses conscious awareness, motivation, positive reinforcement, and a mini reward system. Elimination of the sucking habit generally occurs within TEN days and/or nights.
Do sucking habits always impact teeth?
The forces that determine the degree of damage that may occur can be put into this formula:
Frequency+Intensity+Duration=Damage
The forces that determine the degree of success that may occur can be put into this formula:
Desire+Awareness+Education=SUCCESS!
Sucking Complications:
- Can contribute to a dental malocclusion such as a cross bite, overjet (flaring teeth), or anterior open bite (front teeth don't touch when you bite together).
- Constant pressure of thumb against the roof of the mouth can contribute to a high, narrow, arched palate.
- Sucking habits anchor the tongue down and forward instead of allowing the tongue to rest in the proper position, on the roof of the mouth.
- Contributes to abnormal tongue movement patterns.
- Alters respiratory patterns, contributing to open mouth rest posture of the lips.
- Infections and calluses on the thumbs or fingers that are sucked.
- Speech sound errors.
- Difficulty focusing on a subject when thumb sucking occurs in a school setting or at home.
- Negative affect on peer relationships (difficulty making friends, bullying, inability to go out with friends due to the strong urge of a habit).
Professional Concerns:
Dentists want to eliminate the sucking habit to re-establish natural growth and development of the oro-facial structure. Entire skeletal development can be affected.
Orthodontists want to eliminate sucking habits because the thumb exerts a force in the opposite direction in which the doctor is trying to move the teeth.
Speech Pathologists want to eliminate the habits because they contribute to a low forward rest posture of the tongue and a tongue thrust. If the sucking habit is not eliminated the tongue thrust will remain and the correct tongue position for proper articulation will not occur. Therefore interdental or lateral sound productions can occur affecting speech intelligibility.