Metal Mouth Message Board

Hi everyone! I'm so glad to have found this board, wish I found it earlier when I started this whole thing.

I'm a year into my treatment (my anniversary is in a few days...yay? haha) and just had a "mini implant" or TAD put in my outer bottom jaw. My ortho said that if there was still pain in a week, I should come back for an emergency appointment.

Well, it's been five days, and I've noticed that the screw is wiggly (it wasn't when installed) and I'm feeling a small kind of pain - stings when I use mouthwash. It was also loaded immediately, using elastics, but now when I try to replace the rubber band, it's super uncomfortable! I feel like my jaw is wired shut and opening it makes that stinging feeling worse.

Has anyone else experienced this? I hope to call tomorrow morning but with the holiday weekend I'm not sure how long I'll have to put up with this. I took the elastic off for now, to be safe.

Just need some reassuring thoughts...

Wiggly =not good.

Get in when you can.

[quote="oldfart"]Wiggly =not good.

Get in when you can.[/quote]

Thanks - it's not so painful today, but definitely still wiggly. I'm keeping the elastics off until I can see the orthodontist. I have an appointment for Wednesday!

Just in case anyone out there ever has this problem, I'll post an update.

I went back to the ortho yesterday, and she ended up having to remove the implant. She wasn't able to tighten the TAD (which I thought would be the case), and she explained it would be similar to putting a screw back in drywall that already has a hole - it would keep failing.

As this was the only spot on my jawbone to place the TAD, and the spot where it was will take 6-9 months to heal completely, we have to find another way to correct my bite (the top teeth on my right side are higher than the other side). I hope this doesn't delay my progress.

She removed some of my ceramic brackets - not comfortable! - and put new ones on in slightly different positions. And we're back to elastics... hope it works!

I had my TAD come out like 3 times I think. I actually swallowed one of the screws. My TAD adventure was an adventure, thats for sure. Can they put it into the roof of your mouth? I had good luck there. There are pics in my 'story' if you are interested.

I have one in the side of my upper jaw which is fine. But roof of the mouth sounds scary.

So far no issues with mine coming out. (crosses fingers).

I started with one on each side of the upper jaw but the right side just would not cooperate so he moved it to the roof of my mouth and I never had another problem.