Sleep Apnea Treatment with Oral Appliances

Some doctors will try to convince you that CPAP is the best treatment for your sleep apnea. The truth is, you don’t have to settle for CPAP. No one needs to struggle with CPAP when there are many oral appliances that can treat your sleep apnea just as well as, if not better than, CPAP.

You can speak with your sleep apnea dentist about which oral appliance is best to treat your sleep apnea. A few of the sleep apnea oral appliances are:

• Thornton Adjustable Positioner (TAP)
• SomnoMed MAS
• Herbst Telescopic Appliance
• Tongue Retaining Device (TRD)

Oral appliances are designed to prevent the obstruction of your airway during sleep by stopping the collapse of the soft tissue in the mouth. The soft tissue collapses during sleep and blocks the airway cutting off the flow of oxygen. Oral appliances prevent obstruction in many different ways. Some oral appliances reposition the lower jaw to open the airway wider. Other oral appliances support the soft palate so it does not collapse. Your sleep apnea dentist will determine which oral appliance fits your needs. The oral appliance you and your dentist choose will be custom made to fit perfectly and comfortably inside your mouth.

The oral appliance that is best to treat your sleep apnea depends on your symptoms. To learn more about oral appliances to treat sleep apnea, please contact a sleep apnea dentist in your area.

What do patients feel about wearing an oral appliance vs CPAP?

I just received a e-mail from a patient who recently switched to a comfortable oral appliance from CPAP. I think he clearly stated the answer to how comfortable an oral appliance is so I copy and pasted his answer below.

Niiiiiiiiiicccceee!

Why do patients abandon CPAP? They appreciate the benefits but dislike the mask, hose and entire CPAP set-up. Give most patients an appliance and they blown away by how small and non intrusive appliances are. This is especially true for patients who feel claustrophobic when using CPAP. Some patient may feel a little claustophobic with an appliance initially but it is rare. Patients who switch from CPAP to appliance therapy tend to agree with Gene, ie Niiiiiiiiiicccceee!

BiPAP, ramping, APAP, humidification, heated CPAP hoses all increase the comfort of the patient using CPAP but none of these statistically increase compliance.

The best method of increasing compliance in non-compliant CPAP users is to offer a more comfortable treatment alternative. Oral Appliances are not perfect but the have a 90+% compliance. This is especially impressive because there is an adverse selection of patients, ie, those who have already failed another treatment.

Studies have shown the huge ajority of patients offered a choice between CPAP and Oral Appliances chose the appliance.