By We have heard a lot about how the way we walk, sit or sleep, affect our body, and the muscles. If you wake up with shoulder pain or headache, doctors would probably warn you about your improper sleep postures. However, did you ever have an inch of an idea about your posture affecting your oral health? Well, this might sound a little weird, but yes, they do have an impact on your jaw muscles, your teeth hygiene, and your overall mouth.
In this article, we will throw some light on how bad postures can lead to oral problems. In the wake of understanding the link between the two, we shall discuss the major reasons for how they impact each other. Last but not least, we will also look at some of the essential tips on how to correct the improper postures.
Link Between Posture And Oral Health
Bad postures and oral problems are related to each other quite interestingly. Although almost all our body parts are correlated, some have direct links with the other. Your head position affects the position of the mouth, and thus the teeth, jaws, and other related muscles. So, if you are sitting with your heads bent too far forward, or backward, chances are, you are inviting oral problems.
A bad posture affects the position of your spinal cord. This, in turn, stresses the jaw joint and leads to other dental problems. We know that the hinge of the jaw is one of the most complex joints in our body. It performs a list of crucial functionalities including the working of ligaments, discs, and bones working together to stretch the jaw, clenching the teeth, and so on. When we slouch or bend forward, one half of the jaw is pushed forward unusually. This leaves the skull to move backward and compress the spine. No doubt, the spinal cord plays an important role in controlling various parts of the body and also forms a vital part of the central nervous system. Any stress to it causes problems like headaches, pain in jaws, sleep disorders, and so on.
Symptoms of Bad Posture Affecting your Oral Health
- Headache
- Pain in the neck, back, face, or jaws
- Sleep Disorders
- Fatigue
- Ringing in the ears
- Difficulty chewing
- Pain while opening and closing mouth
- Ear Infection
- Inflammation in muscles of the mouth, etc.
Here are the 5 Major Reasons How Bad Posture Affects Your Oral Health
1. Jaw and Facial Pain: The way our teeth come together is called bites’. Teeth are aligned to fit together when we close our mouth. With the constant pressure applied at the jaw point, the bites may not align themselves properly. This can lead to pain in the jaws. You can have pain while making any mouth movements too. This, in turn, can trigger facial pain.
2. Tooth Damage: If the jaws are not aligned, it can cause misplaced tooth too. The outcome of this could be a crooked or chipped tooth. Isn’t it surprising how your poor postures can affect your teeth?
3. Tenderness of Face and Jaw: The constant stretched and strain of the muscles can also lead to the tenderness of face and jaw. There might be a condition where your jaws are locked.
4. TMJ Disorder: You might have heard about TMJ disorder. If case you have not, it stands for Temporomandibular Joint Disorder, which is a medical condition, in which your jaws don’t work together properly. The TMJ joint connects your jawbone to the skull. One of the major causes of TMJ Disorder is the misaligning of jaws, which, as already seen, is triggered by bad posture.
5. Abnormal Mandibular Positioning, Nerve Compression, Ligament Strain And Disc Compression: All these are the results of bad posture, which somehow affect the muscles and joints in and around your mouth, thus affecting your oral health.
Correction of postures
Let’s have a look at how bad postures can be effectively corrected, to keep away the oral health hazards.
- The Problem: The way we walk, sit, or sleep, is not as it should be. The head ought to be straight, in line with the shoulders. During sedentary activities, there is a lot of stress on the TMJ muscles, along with the head, neck, and back. A good posture can alleviate the problem.
- The Solution: To prevent such problems, one must take care of their posture. You should walk with your head up. Sitting upright, without bending your spinal cord necessarily is what most experts will recommend. Not just that, you should also keep your stomach muscles straight, so that your core is tight, and the posture is correct. Regular exercise and yoga are no doubt one of the best ways to correct your bad postures.
Conclusion
In this article, we see the effect of bad postures on our dental health. We have seen how the two are connected, along with multiple reasons for how bad postures affect your oral health. We may seem to ignore some of the symptoms, like, numbness in one of the hands, frequent headaches, sleep deprivation, fatigue, ringing in the ear, etc. which may be caused due to poor postures.
These symptoms may impose problems in your jaws, and teeth, as well. An improper posture affects the spinal cord on which your head sits. The jaw muscles and your head work together to give you the best of comforts. In case of any alterations, or misalignments, your body is prone to the risk of oral problems as well. You might want to check with your dentist, the reason for the jaw pain that you’ve been experiencing lately. Even dentists are trained on the importance of good posture during their course of study.
The oral sedation dentistry training sheds light on how bad postures are bad not only for their general well-being but also for oral health. The problems that come with poor posture can have a significant impact over a prolonged period. Therefore, it is important to get diagnosed by the general physician, as well as your dentist, if any such symptoms persist.
