Ellen came into my office with a 12 years history of severe pain all over her body, in her face, neck, jaws, hips, knees and feet. She also had an enormous open bite and only two teeth in her entire mouth met.

Her story began with ear and joint pain and she saw an ENT whp told her it was coming from her Left TMJoint. The ENT referred her to a dentist who made he an appliance and she quickly developed a severe open bit. After the development of the open bite she quickly had pain spread throughout her entire body. She sw multiple pain physicians and dentists and was offered surgical orthognathic surgery and orthodontics but no relief of her pain was ever forthcoming. They also recommended extracting 8 molars to allow her bite to close. She was told it would never be closed without extractions or major jaw surgery.

At our consultation appointment almost all of her pain was relieved temporarily with Spray and stretch technique of Dr Janet Travell. The worst pain appeared to be cervical in nature. I also explained and showed Ellen how the whole body works together and changes in one area can cause changes everywhere.

Ellen was fitted with a diagnostic physiologic orthotic, had trigger point injections done by me and she was taught how to utilize spray and stretch techniques at home. We also worked with a Physical Therapist,
Dan Hoglum who did extensive muscle release work especially in cervical and back regions.

Ellen responded beautifully to the Diagnostic Physiologic Appliance and rapidly eliminated all of the jaw issues with it in place. She also saw an Atlas-Orthoganol Chiropractor Dr Mark Freund who also utilized SOT Chiropractic Techniques, and did Craino work and chirodontics.

Long term treatment was a problem because without her appliance she had an enormous open bite and if she took it out her pain returned.

We discussed many options to correct her bite and ruled out orthodontics and orthognathic surgery because Ellen was finally pain free and did not want to risk relapse. Ellen preferred to not have a long term gold orthotic but wanted to function on her own teeth again.

Together we decided to attempt to close the open bite created 12 years prior.

The first step was to gradually reduce the second and third molars and the appliance. Because of the amount of reduction and the fact that all the enamel was worn off the teeth it was necessary to prepare the teeth for composite resins on the biting surface to allow additional reduction.

It was now possible to close the bite considerably. At this point it was possilbe to do conventional orthodontics but Ellen chose to do a few molar crowns to allow final correction of her bite. No work was done on anterior teeth or bicuspids. Ellen was seen for 18 month follow-up reporting 100% “Cure” or relief of jaw symptoms and has only minimal issues anywhere in her body.Ellen Explains in this Video Testimonial the story in her own words: