Confused

[JeanetteXXX]

Hi!! My name is Jeanette, and i've had my braces on for about a year and three months now. Right now, im using the ruber bands to correct my overbite.I was told that I would have to have sugery to widen the bottom and push the top back (is this even needed?) to correct it if the ruber bands dont. My ortho told me that there was nothing else she could do to make this happen (is this true?).

[Zoso]

It's impossible to give you a definitive answer, as everything depends on the particular case.

It sounds like what you have is an overjet, rather than an overbite - your upper front teeth are too far in front of the lower front teeth? Anyway, sometimes this can happen just because of where the teeth are, and in this case braces and rubber bands and such can do the job. Sometimes it is because the jaw bones didn't grow to the right relative sizes - most commonly the lower jaw is too small, and/or set back too far, but the same overjet could result, I would think, if the upper jaw grew too much. In either case, if there is a significantly large skeletal discrepancy, then you can only get complete correction, with stable results through surgery. However, it may be possible to get close, or to treat to a less than perfect bite, but in such a way as to camouflage the problem, resulting in an aesthetic that is pleasing to the patient. Another option that can work well in some but definitely not in all cases is to extract premolars to correct the bite - the jaws would not be corrected (so, for example, a weak chin from an underdeveloped lower jaw would remain), and the molars would not be in the proper (Class I) relationship, but the bite would look good. But, as I said, this is only appropriate in certain cases, and when used where it is not appropriate, it can lead to poor facial aesthetics.

I'm interested that your doc mentioned widening the lower jaw - I'd have thought that the lower jaw would be more likely to be too wide in an overjet case (but I'm just guessing). In any case, this (widening the lower) is not something that is terribly common, as far as I've noticed.

Anyway, why don't you sit tight and see if those elastics don't get you where you want to be, rather than worrying too much just yet? All may turn out well!