I have a dentist friend and I asked him about dental devices for sleep apnea.  He examined me and told me my teeth were too small and tipped in which was causing my tongue to flop back into my throat when I slept.  He tried an orthodontic device that raised my teeth length up 6cm and brought my jaw forward.  (It was very underslung)  After wandering around looking like Jaws for awhile, both of us were delighted to discover that I no longer had to use the mask!  However, this treatment is very expensive and consists of completely crowning and veneering each tooth and hours in the dentist chair getting the bite just right.  It also got rid of my TMJ which was causing extreme headaches.  I feel and look a good ten years younger and have lost ten pounds.  By the way, Provigil works wonders on getting rid of excessive daytime sleepiness.  I was on that for quite some time until the dental procedure was complete.

Did you have a sleep study before and after your dental treatment to verify the degree of improvement, and that you are in fact "cured"?

pcobb wrote:

I have a dentist friend and I asked him about dental devices for sleep apnea.  He examined me and told me my teeth were too small and tipped in which was causing my tongue to flop back into my throat when I slept.  He tried an orthodontic device that raised my teeth length up 6cm and brought my jaw forward.  (It was very underslung)  After wandering around looking like Jaws for awhile, both of us were delighted to discover that I no longer had to use the mask!  However, this treatment is very expensive and consists of completely crowning and veneering each tooth and hours in the dentist chair getting the bite just right.  It also got rid of my TMJ which was causing extreme headaches.  I feel and look a good ten years younger and have lost ten pounds.  By the way, Provigil works wonders on getting rid of excessive daytime sleepiness.  I was on that for quite some time until the dental procedure was complete.

Did your friend do a sleep study?  How exactly did you "discover" that you no longer needed the mask?  Not to dissuade you, but there have been folks that have thought they were doing better, but found their AHI was not reduced enough, or in some cases actually raised.  Please, for your health, get a sleep study done to ensure that your treatment was as effective as you think it was.

Regards,

Mike

Yes, I agree with both previous posters. Get a sleep study done, to confirm that your OSA is gone. The medication you took to relieve your daytime sleepiness might have masked the symptoms of OSA. I hope what your dentist did is a cure, but I'd want to be sure, if it were me.


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Larry