It seems as though many of us wonder about timeframes concerning repositioning splints. I know that I have. I found this study on them that was conducted at a medical college in Georgia.
The treatment of temporomandibular disorders through repositioning splint therapy: a follow-up study
Medical College of Georgia, Augusta, USA.
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of repositioning splint therapy as a conservative treatment modality for TMD patients. The treatment sequence of 160 randomly sampled TMD patients was monitored in order to assess different aspects of the patients' response to splint therapy. Included among these aspects were the pretreatment symptoms; the treatment duration required for initial and final alleviation of symptoms; the number of patients requiring surgery; and the particular appliance and its wear pattern utilized to maintain the treatment results. The treatment success was based on the remission of symptoms including but not limited to pain to palpation, headaches, earaches, jaw locking, and joint noises. Eighty-nine and four tenths percent (89.4%) of the patients experienced a complete remission of symptoms and did not require any surgical intervention. The average time for initial improvement was 22.3 days, while the average time for complete remission of symptoms was 4.3 months. The results of the study indicate that repositioning splint therapy is an effective treatment modality for the conservative treatment of temporomandibular disorders.
Hi there Cheryl...
Thanks for sharing that! I do wonder about the "pre-treatment symptoms". The study outcome is very favorable - but for me, I wonder if having the hypermobile joint/loose ligments puts me in a whole other category - maybe one the repositioning splint won't address??? Is there any reference with the entire study, and all those details? Nevertehless, this is very encouraging for most of us. Would be interesting to find out why that 10% failed... and what makes them different from the rest.
Again --thanks loads!! http://www.healthboards.com/ubb/heart.gifRR
Cheryl!
I can not thank you enough for this information! Wow! A medical school did this research. Now is that interesting or what. I wonder if this study was requested by the NIH/NIDCR????? AND isn't it interesting that the NIDCR is currently updating their brochure on TMD treatment and they are STILL making the same stand about repositioning splints! You know what those are awesome numbers! That is nothing to sneeze at all! My gosh!
Thank you Cheryl for your awesome, awesome research skills once again!
Hugs
Diane :-)
Hi,
Here's where I found out this information:
[url="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_u ids=10029748&dopt=Abstract"]http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list _uids=10029748&dopt=Abstract[/url]
Cheryl
[This message has been edited by CherylLynn24 (edited 09-08-2003).]
[This message has been edited by CherylLynn24 (edited 09-08-2003).]
[This message has been edited by CherylLynn24 (edited 09-08-2003).]
Repositioning Splints 
