What Do Rubber Bands Do To Your Teeth When You Have Braces

There are several parts to braces.

What do rubber bands do to your teeth when you have braces.

Rubber bands align your top and bottom teeth making them crucial for the bite fixing stage of your orthodontic treatment. To this end braces have several parts that work together. If you have braces your orthodontist might give you small rubber bands to attach to your brackets to help move and align your teeth. Rubber bands are an important part of the orthodontic treatment.

First there are the brackets which are the square metal pieces bonded directly to the teeth. Orthodontic rubber bands or elastics are one of the most common tools orthodontists use to straighten your teeth. Most of the time you are supposed to use your rubber bands while eating. While they may cause some discomfort they re an important part of your overall orthodontic plan.

Some patients will have to wear them for a full year or longer. The braces themselves help straighten your teeth while the rubber bands used with braces help to straighten and align your bite. The small rubber or metal elastics more commonly called rubber bands that surround your braces are technically called elastic ligatures a ligature is used primarily to keep the archwire held into the slot on the bracket but they can also direct the teeth in a particular direction depending on the type of ligature used and how it is tied onto the tooth. The following is a more detailed breakdown of the various parts that are included in braces.

Brackets affix to the teeth. We use rubber bands for almost every patient who receives traditional metal braces as they provide the necessary connective forces needed to move your jaws and teeth into proper alignment but what do rubber bands do for braces. The only time rubber bands are taken out of the mouth is when the patient eats or brushes their teeth. You should be able to eat with your braces rubber bands on without any issue.

Since this is the most difficult part of the braces process you will want to be sure that you wear them correctly and do not leave them off after eating. If you have issues with eating talk to your orthodontist and they may recommend taking the bands off while you eat. You wear them while you sleep and you use a new pair everyday. Braces rubber bands work by latching on to small hooks found on the brackets that have been affixed to the teeth one on the top row and one on the bottom row.

They should not block your mouth or your throat. Once the correction has occured the rubber bands are not worn as much and slowly you are weaned off of them.