Custom Sports Mouthguards in Vestal, NY

A permanent front tooth knocked out at fourteen is not a repair. It is a schedule. A bonded temporary through the teenage years because implants cannot be placed until the jaw stops growing, then an implant and a crown in the twenties, then a replacement crown every so often for the next sixty years, with a bone graft somewhere in the middle when the ridge starts to give way.

Set against that, a custom mouthguard is the cheapest dental work your child will ever have. That is the entire argument for this page, and everything below is detail.

What Actually Happens to Teeth in Sport

The injuries fall into a few predictable categories, and knowing which one you are looking at changes what you do in the next ten minutes.

• Chipped or fractured teeth. The most common by far. Often repairable with bonding or a filling if seen promptly, and far more involved if the fracture reaches the nerve.
• Displaced teeth. Pushed out of position, loosened, or driven up into the bone. These need repositioning and stabilizing quickly, and they are easy to underestimate because the tooth is still there.
• Knocked out teeth. The serious one. A permanent tooth out of its socket has a window measured in minutes, not hours.
• Soft tissue injuries. Split lips, bitten tongues and cut cheeks, which a guard prevents simply by being between the teeth and everything else.
• Jaw injuries. Less common, and the reason a blow to the face with any suspicion of a fracture goes to an emergency room first.

If a permanent tooth comes out, the clock starts immediately. Pick it up by the crown and never the root, rinse it briefly in milk or water without scrubbing, and if you can, put it straight back in the socket and have them bite gently on a clean cloth. If reinserting is not possible, keep it in milk, or in the child's own saliva, and get to a dentist inside the hour. Do not reinsert a baby tooth, which can damage the permanent tooth forming behind it. Call our emergency line on the way, day or night.

It Is Not Only the Contact Sports

Football and hockey mandate guards, so those players are largely covered. The injuries we see tend to come from the sports where nobody thinks to wear one.

Basketball and baseball account for a striking share of sport related dental injuries, mostly from elbows, collisions and balls arriving faster than expected. Soccer produces its share from heads meeting heads. Then there is everything outside organized sport entirely: skateboarding, BMX, mountain biking and trampolines, none of which come with a coach telling anyone to wear anything.

Our Learning Center has a summer survival guide for exactly the season when most of these happen. The rule of thumb worth applying is simple. If there is a ball, a stick, a hard surface, or another person moving at speed, teeth are in play.

Why the Custom One Is Different on a Field

The case for a custom guard in sport is not the same as the case for a custom night splint, because the demands are different.

A boil-and-bite has to be held in place by clenching. That is tolerable sitting still and impossible while sprinting, shouting and breathing hard through your mouth, which is why so many of them end up pushed out with the tongue and carried in a hand or a pocket. A guard made from a model of the actual teeth stays put without being held, so a player can talk, breathe and play while wearing it.

It also puts thickness where the impact lands rather than where the plastic happened to flow, it does not thin out over the biting surfaces on first use, and because it is not bulky it does not interfere with speech. Every one of those is really the same point in a different form: the child will keep it in.

One thing we will not claim, because the evidence does not support it: a mouthguard does not prevent concussion. It protects teeth, lips, tongue and jaw, which is plenty. Anybody selling you one as head injury protection is overstating what it does.

Braces, Retainers and Mouths That Are Still Growing

A child in braces needs a guard more than anyone, not less. Brackets turn an ordinary knock into a mouthful of lacerations, and an unprotected impact can undo orthodontic work that has taken years. Guards for braces are made differently, with room for the appliance and for teeth that are deliberately moving, so tell us at the appointment.

Growing mouths also mean guards expire on a shorter cycle than adult ones. A guard that fitted at the start of middle school will not fit by the end of it, and a guard that no longer fits is one that gets left in a bag. Bring it to checkups and we will tell you honestly when it needs remaking, which for an actively growing child is often every season or two. Our Learning Center covers choosing a guard for a young athlete, and the back to school checklist is the natural time to sort it.

Sports Guard Questions From Parents

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  My child's sport is not a contact sport. Do they really need one?
  Contact is not the only mechanism. Basketball and baseball generate a large share of dental injuries without being contact sports in the formal sense, because elbows, bats and balls do not care about the classification. Non-contact does not mean no impact. If the sport involves a ball, a bat or a stick, hard ground, or other players at speed, a guard is worth it.
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  They have braces. Can they wear a mouthguard?
  Yes, and they particularly should. Brackets make any impact considerably worse for the soft tissue, and a knock can set orthodontic treatment back months. A guard for a patient in braces is designed with clearance for the appliance and tolerance for teeth that are still moving, so it is not the same construction as a standard guard. Mention the braces when you book so we allow for it, and whichever of our dentists you see will check the clearance at the fit appointment.
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  How often will it need replacing?
  For an adult, a few seasons with reasonable care. For a child or teenager who is actively growing, often every season or two, because the fit is the whole point and a mouth that has grown makes the guard useless. Bring it to routine checkups and we will check the fit alongside everything else rather than leaving you to guess.
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  How do I get them to actually wear it?
  Fit does most of the work. The usual reason a guard gets abandoned is that it is bulky, it moves, or it makes talking difficult, and all three are symptoms of a guard that was never shaped to that mouth. Beyond that, the practical tricks are keeping it in the kit bag rather than at home, putting it in before leaving rather than at the field, and letting them pick the color themselves. A guard they chose is a guard they wear.
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  Can they use their night guard for sport?
  No, and it is worth being clear about this in both directions. A night splint is built to resist slow grinding pressure over hours, not to absorb a sudden impact, and it is the wrong material and thickness for the job. It would also be expensive to destroy. If grinding is the issue, that is our occlusal night guards page, and if the jaw itself is the problem, start with TMJ treatment. They are separate appliances and separate purchases.
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  A tooth got knocked out at a game. What do we do right now?
  Find the tooth and pick it up by the crown, not the root. Rinse it briefly with milk or water if it is dirty, without scrubbing. If you can, put it back in the socket and have them bite gently on a clean cloth. If not, keep it in milk or in their own saliva, never in plain water for long and never dry. Get to a dentist inside the hour. Call (607) 785-3339 on the way, and after hours ask for the on-call dentist.