Best Solution For Your Sleep Apnea: Myofunctional Therapy

Sleep apnea affects approximately 20% of U.S. adults, and many people are unaware that they suffer from this potentially serious breathing disorder. In the short term, untreated sleep apnea can result in difficulties falling asleep, poor rest, and irritability. And if it’s left untreated, these interruptions in nighttime breathing can lead to serious whole-body health issues, like a higher risk of a heart attack or a stroke.

But at Inspira Advanced Dentistry, Dr. Stephanie Loller and our team are here to help. We provide adult myofunctional therapy for people with sleep apnea. By retraining the face and jaw muscles and adjusting how you breathe, it’s often possible to eliminate sleep apnea without traditional treatments like CPAP machines.

Understanding Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Obstructive Sleep Apnea, or OSA for short, is the most common type of sleep apnea, making up about 90% of cases. In this type of sleep apnea, the soft tissue of the mouth, jaw, and throat collapse during sleep, temporarily blocking the airway. 

‍

These blockages can last just a few seconds or up to a minute, and may happen dozens or even hundreds of times per night. If you have obstructive sleep apnea, you or your sleeping partner may notice symptoms like:

‍

• Heavy snoring with brief interruptions
• Waking up with a gasping or choking sensation
• Poor quality sleep
• Daytime drowsiness
• Irritability
• Morning headaches
• Dry mouth
• Sore throat
• Decreased libido (sex drive)

‍

Over time, sleep apnea deprives your body of the oxygen it needs to function properly. This can lead to tiredness in the short term, even if you get plenty of sleep. And eventually, it raises your risk of cardiovascular issues like heart attack and stroke.

‍

In many cases, obstructive sleep apnea is caused by issues with the muscles in your face. For example, if you tend to breathe through your mouth, you have a higher risk of developing sleep apnea. Or if your facial muscles are not strong enough, they will collapse at rest, blocking your airway and causing OSA.

‍

There are lots of different ways to treat sleep apnea, but at Inspira Advanced Dentistry, we offer myofunctional therapy for adults. By changing your oral movement patterns, breathing habits, and jaw alignment, it’s possible to correct OSA without the need for surgery or alternative solutions like a CPAP machine.

The benefits of myofunctional therapy for OSA

• Reduces breathing interruptions – With myofunctional therapy, you can strengthen the muscles in your face and mouth, preventing tissue from sagging and reducing or even eliminating breathing interruptions.
  
• Addresses snoring – Myofunctional therapy can eliminate snoring, allowing your sleeping partner to rest peacefully.
• Enhances sleep quality – Without breathing interruptions, you’ll enjoy restful sleep and feel more energetic and active throughout the day.
• Reduced need for CPAP – CPAPs require constant power, must be taken with you during travel, and require you to sleep on your back. With myofunctional therapy, you can treat OSA with fewer changes to your sleeping habits.
• Better overall health – Restful sleep is essential for your immune health, athletic performance and recovery, and overall well-being. With myofunctional therapy for obstructive sleep apnea in Campbell, CA, you can enhance your overall wellness.

How Myofunctional Therapy Works To Treat Sleep Apnea

Obstructive sleep apnea occurs when the soft tissues of your face, mouth, and throat relax, sag, and block your airway during sleep. There are a wide variety of myofunctional therapy exercises that can be used to strengthen your facial muscles, improve your breathing patterns, and reduce or eliminate sleep apnea.

Breathing exercises

There are a lot of breathing exercises for sleep apnea that your dentist at Inspira Advanced Dentistry can do with you. For example, you may blow up a balloon with as much air as you can while breathing through your nose, or suck yogurt through a very thin straw.

Both of these breathing exercises encourage nasal breathing, which is essential for a healthy oral posture and for reducing your risk of sleep apnea. This is because breathing through your nose helps keep your tongue in a healthier position, and reduces the risk of your tongue or other facial tissue sagging and blocking your airway.

Oral posture training

Along with breathing exercises, your doctor may recommend oral posture training. Healthy oral posture is when you’re breathing through your nose and your tongue is gently resting behind the tops of your front teeth.

In oral posture training, you will perform exercises that help encourage this resting position, like touching your tongue to the top of your teeth, pressing your tongue against your palate (the top of your mouth), and more. With regular practice, these exercises help encourage proper oral posture.

Strengthening face and jaw muscles

These exercises are very patient-specific. During your diagnosis, your doctor will determine if you have any facial muscles that are weak and require additional training. For example, your doctor may recommend stretching your tongue, exercises to strengthen the lips, or stretches and exercises that can strengthen your jaw muscles.

The goal is to strengthen all of your facial muscles and ensure that they are working properly. The stronger your facial muscles are, the less likely it is that your tissue will sag and block your airway at night.

Snoring Solutions with Myofunctional Therapy

Snoring is strongly related to sleep apnea, but it isn’t exactly the same thing. Snoring happens when oral tissues vibrate during sleep as air flows through them, and usually affects the upper palate and uvula.

Myofunctional therapy can be an effective snoring solution, even for patients who may not suffer from sleep apnea. Enhancing muscle tone in the face and ensuring proper breathing patterns helps prevent tissue from sagging and vibrating. It also encourages nasal breathing, which means that snoring is much less likely.

Getting Started with Myofunctional Therapy

Get a consultation with an expert

Depending on your case, you may need to see a sleep specialist to be diagnosed with obstructive sleep apnea. This usually involves a clinical visit, as well as an in-office or at-home sleep test where special instruments are used to monitor your breathing and sleep quality.

If you do have OSA and your doctor believes that myofunctional therapy can help, the team at Inspira Advanced Dentistry is here for you. We're experts in myofunctional therapy both for children and adults. Our team can create a personalized plan that will relieve snoring, poor sleep, and other symptoms of OSA.

Schedule regular therapy consultations

After your first visit with the team at Inspira Advanced Dentistry, your dentist will create a customized treatment plan. Typically, you will come into our office once per week for therapy appointments, which will take around an hour. During each visit, your dentist will assess your progress and then work with you to perform a variety of jaw exercises, breathing exercises, and stretches.

Keep up your treatment at home

Along with regular visits to Inspira Advanced Dentistry, you’ll need to continue to perform certain stretches and exercises at home between your appointments. These help retrain your jaw and facial muscles and ensure that your treatment continues to progress.

Track your progress

Most adults need between six and 12 months of myofunctional therapy for sleep apnea, but every patient is different. Once your treatment is over, you may still need to come into our office for an occasional checkup. 

Also, you will need to continue performing stretches and exercises at home, often indefinitely. This helps ensure that you maintain your progress and do not fall back into bad habits like mouth breathing.

Myofunctional Therapy And Other Sleep Apnea Treatments

Depending on your needs, myofunctional therapy may be all that’s needed to cure your sleep apnea. However, it can also be used alongside other sleep apnea treatments for some patients. 

Oral Appliance Therapy (OAT)

Oral Appliance Therapy (OAT) is often used alongside myofunctional therapy to promote a healthier jaw position during sleep. This treatment uses an “oral appliance” that looks similar to a night guard or mouth guard. When worn during sleep, this appliance shifts the jaw into a healthier position, reducing or eliminating the risk of OSA.

Orthodontics

In some cases, orthodontic treatment like Invisalign or braces may be recommended alongside myofunctional therapy. Orthodontics can change the shape of the jaws and position of the teeth to reduce the symptoms of OSA.

CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) machines

CPAP machines use a face and nose mask to pump a stream of air into the lungs when you sleep. This prevents tissue from sagging. However, CPAP machines are bulky, loud, and can be inconvenient to use. Still, they are a good option for patients who may not be able to completely eliminate OSA with myofunctional therapy.

Surgical treatment

Thanks to advances in other treatments, surgical intervention for obstructive sleep apnea is very rare. But for patients with certain anatomical challenges like enlarged tonsils and adenoids or excessive oral tissue, surgical treatments may be needed to fully resolve OSA.

Is Myofunctional Therapy For Sleep Apnea Right For Me?

If you have mild to moderate obstructive sleep apnea and you are interested in an alternative to treatments like CPAP and surgery, myofunctional therapy for sleep apnea in Campbell, CA, from Inspira Advanced Dentistry may be right for you.

For patients who have OSA caused by poor facial muscle tone, mouth breathing, and similar OMDs (orofacial myofunctional disorders), myofunctional can be an extremely effective tool, especially when combined with other treatments like oral appliance therapy (OAT).

However, treatment does require some personal commitment. You will need to visit our office regularly for treatment on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, and commit to performing stretches and exercises every day at home.
Also, myofunctional therapy for sleep apnea may not be enough to fully treat OSA in some patients. Lifestyle changes and additional treatments like surgery may still be needed in severe cases.

Answering FAQs About Myofunctional Therapy And Sleep Apnea

Can myofunctional therapy completely cure sleep apnea?

Yes, but it depends on the patient. Patients with minor-to-moderate obstructive sleep apnea may get full relief with myofunctional therapy, but those with more severe cases may need additional intervention.

How long before I start seeing results?

You will usually start to notice results within just a few weeks, though it may take several months for some patients to have noticeably more restful sleep.

Is myofunctional therapy covered by insurance?

In most cases, the answer is “no.” However, at Inspira Advanced Dentistry, our team would be happy to explore the benefits offered by your plan and to see if your treatment will be covered by insurance.

Who is an ideal candidate for myofunctional therapy?

Anyone with mild to moderate obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) can be treated with myofunctional therapy. To be a good candidate, you should also show a willingness to commit to several months of treatment, including daily stretches and exercises that you’ll do on your own.

Schedule Your Consultation At Inspira Advanced Dentistry

If you believe you have sleep apnea and you’re looking for alternatives to traditional treatments like CPAP machines and surgery, Dr. Loller and the team at Inspira Advanced Dentistry are here to help. We specialize in myofunctional therapy for sleep apnea in Campbell, CA.

‍

So don’t wait, and don’t let sleep apnea interrupt your sleep or increase your risk of serious health issues like heart attack or stroke. Give us a call at (408) 298-0777 to schedule your first visit, or contact us online to book a consultation with our dental team today.