archwire strength

[pjacjac]

so I'm 4 months into my treatment and apparently I'm already on the highest strength wire there is. Aside from the fact that it went on yesterday and my teeth are freaking, that seems fast to me. I've only had 3 adjustments since my initial appointment. Granted my teeth were fairly straight to begin with just had a 6mm overjet and no bite.

Just curious if anyone else went through archwires this quickly? This current wire is making all my upper teeth very unhappy again.

[Harriet]

I'm quite new to all this, so I'm not completely sure, but I think the thin wires they use to start with are to get your teeth more or less in line with each other before they start working on things like bite and overjets. If your teeth were quite straight to begin with, it would make sense that you wouldn't need the thinner wires for very long I think??

[LoveOrtho]

Read this... http://www.archwired.com/ArchWires_Dr_Yang.htm

Hope that helps you with your question/concern.

[Lynette]

Great article!

Sounds like you are progressing very quickly. I am 10 months in and onto my 3rd wire which is rectangular.

[pjacjac]

thanks for the article that helped, my ortho seems happy with the changes in my bite, so I'm guessing I have the joy of elastics coming at my next appointment.

I'm hoping speedy progress means these things get off sooner.

[francis29]

I am 4 months in and have been in the rectangular wire for 7 weeks (since my 3rd adjustment), at today's appointment all we added was a power chain on top of it. My bottom teeth have gaps and are in a medium wire same as last adjustment and we added power chain to that. I am surprised how much the power chains are hurting my teeth tho without a wire change, bc I was pi.zzed we didn't change my wires today because that will mean I have been in the same upper and lower wires for 11 weeks at my July 25th appt. Being 42 I do not want to waste one single second in these things, I want to keep progressing, but I am sure my ortho knows what she is doing.

My teeth were fairly straight to begin with as well and I was out of the thin first wire in 3 weeks. My ortho said today that at my next appt she will likely put on the finishing wire and that she can bend it or something to tweak any tooth that isn't yet perfectly in place (which they are not perfect yet, but close). I asked a ton of questions but you know how busy they are but I think my ortho said she was putting on my finishing wires next appt (at the 5 month mark and we estimated my braces time at approx 6 mos).

I think when you start out fairly straight you go into stronger wires faster, just my .2 tho.

Frances