99% OF KIDS TODAY HAVE UNDERDEVELOPED JAWS: Dr Ben Miraglia

Not until I started reading a ton about jaw size, airway development, sleep quality, did I really have any perspective on why modern day jaws are so underdeveloped. A lot of this started during the industrial revolution. Mom's started working, breast feeding periods shortened, and foods got softer and processed to make life more convenient. However, this had many negative effects as it relates to health due to our jaws getting smaller, a result of our tongues and jaws having to work significantly less. All of this decreased our ability to push the jaw forward at up with enough force as we were developing to ensure our jaws grew wide enough to fit all our teeth and ensure our tongue fit in our mouths with plenty of space by the time we were adults.

This is a clip of Dr. Ben Miraglia, in my opinion one of the best airway centric dentists in the game, talking on the Airway Health Solutions podcast about how 99% if not all kids, have underdeveloped jaws. The word is slowly trickling down in the world of modern medicine, but I would say it's not common knowledge yet. Parents need to understand that the faster they take action for their kids, the more time there will be to ensure their children's airways grow to adequate size for many health reasons. The hard thing is finding practitioners in your area that share this belief and are experienced in this world.

Dr. Kevin Boyd, a pediatric orthodontist out of Chicago, was talking to me about the width of the upper jaw from a health perspective. He will start expanding kids' jaws as early as 3-4 years old if need be to ensure kids have enough space for all their teeth to grow in cases where proper nutrition and strengthening of the tongue and muscles of the jaw wasn't adequate in helping grow enough at an early age. I asked him if he started expanding kids at that young of an age, how big would you want to ensure their jaws are by the time they hit 18 and he said as far as molar width,m according to McNamara, 40 mm measured at the ML cusps at the gingival margins, is usually sufficient for optimal function and esthetics. Just for perspective, I have had allergies, asthma my whole life and have always been a mouth breather, and my upper jaw at 44 years old, was only 31mm. The equivalent of a 7 year old child!!