dental/orthodontist worry

[KMR281]

Hi,
My 5yo was over in germany with his dad, and my MIL took him to doctor (for general check, without my permission, but anyhoo) and they said there was abig problem and referred him to orthodontist,who has said he has an 'acute and critical condition':

the orthodontist says his top jaw is rounded at the front (should be flat) and this was caused by dummy sucking (is this true?? hi gave up at 2.5y and I asked my dentist when he was little, and she said dummy sucking doens't make teeth stick out).
His top jaw is too far over his bottom jaw, and his bottom jaw is squint in relation to his top jaw. He is not breathing through his nose. This will seemingly have implications later in life, and affect his development (mentally and physically).

I won't go into all the discussions on this that I had with husband last night. Oh, and apparently he is underdeveloped for his age (which neither of us believe). So it was a very cheery talk - not.

He has been given exercises to do, these are:

to breathe through his nose 30 times a day (at least)
when he is watching tv, to have a card in his mouth that he holds there with his lips (keeps his mouth shut and make him breathe thru nose, and brings bottom jaw forward)
not to chew his fingers at all.
to blow his nose regularly.
to eat with his mouth shut.

anyhow, that's how things are, taking him to our dentist on May 10th to get a referral to the orthodontist here.

The orthodontist was also apparently trying to hint that finger sucking was due to Christian not getting enough 'warmth' at home - !!! the blinking cheek.

his teeth do stick out, but I thought they were just sticky out teeth, rather than a malformed jaw, which is what seems to be said by the orthodontist. Just not sure what to do really. Feel a bit pants.

I'd get a second opinion.
Does sound like some kind of massive cultural difference in perspectives and priorities, though.
Was the German orthodontist a conventional one or somebody on the holistic fringe?
Have you a regular dentist in the UK, you can see an orthodontist privately if the dentist thinks it might be wise.
DS had braces at 8yo, fwiw, so I have some experience of early malclusion (crooked teeth) being corrected.

Well, at least you can't accuse your MIL of being disinterested in her grandchildren!

If your DS is not breathing through his nose, the German orthodontist might be onto something.

You shoud get a second opinion, but it is normal for the top arch to be bigger than the bottom arch in childhood, and the bottom arch does catch up over the years.

We live in Germany, and orthodontists are a part of life here. Probably one in three children in dd1's class (11/12 yo) has a brace or some sort of orthodontist treatment. Everyone pays a lot more for healthcare, and so doctors and dentists are a lot more prepared to diagnose problems. I think these problems do really exist, in general, but the hcps do tend to, ahem, play on parents' fears a bit. We have also been told that dd1's jaw is way of out alignment and would lead to long-term damage if not treated bla bla bla, but we got that opinion from three orthos before going ahead with long-term treatment.

5 is a bit young to start treatment - normally they're more like 7 or 8, after the second teeth have come through.

The difference between the British and German systems - when I was 13 I was sent to a hospital clinic in Wales for testing to see if I needed a brace, and the answer was no, the problem wasn't severe enough to warrant action. But when we took dd1 to the orthodontist here, he took one look at my mouth and said, 'Oh yeah, I can see where she got it from, I can't believe your misalignment wasn't treated'. But my terrible misalignment hasn't led to any problems so far...

The stuff about the exercises I've never heard of, and the not enough warmth at home thing is off-the-wall shite you can obviously ignore. You do get doctors here who are into Steiner anthropowhatsit weirdo ideas, and you learn to ignore them. But I would agree that a visit to a private orthodontist in the UK is most likely to get ou an honest answer.

Not enough warmth at home? Our dd has really wonky teeth, she has an extremely small jaw but large mouth hole. I took her to see an orthadontist a couple of months ago, he didn't even xray her but told me it would cost a lot of money in the future. She hasn't lost enough teeth to make a brace feasible and he didn't want to start any treatment yet in case he twisted the roots of her teeth.
Second opinion and turn the heating up

I was a mouth breathing finger sucking child. because my tongue wasn't pushing up on the roof of my mouth for most of my childhood then the palete hasn't developed properly and my teeth are very crowded and crooked. I also have a clicky jaw (tmj) because of this. I wasn't treated in childhood because of the 'its not that bad' attitude of my dentist so as an adult I am undergoing a series of extractions, braces, retainers to try and correct it. A better treatment would be to put a device in to expand my upper jaw, then straighten the teeth out with a conventional brace but I can't afford it. Its costing almost £4000 as it is.

I am convinced if I had lived in a teeth interseted country such as Hungary, USA or Germany I would have been treated as a child.

As an orthodontist, his opinion on your son's jaw is probably worth following up on, as you plan to do.

As an orthodontist, his opinion on your family relationships is about as useful as mine, i.e. not useful at all, as neither of us knows anything about you and it is not our area of expertise.

Nothing to feel pants about.

Thanks All,
think will see what UK orthodontist says. Working on getting him to breath through nose etc, as that is probably a good idea in any case. Will see what a 2nd orthodontist reckons to his teeth and jaw. Certainly don't want to leave anything that might cause problems later on, but on the other hand, don't want him to have any unnecessary treatment either if he might grow out of whatever is (perhaps) wrong.
And yes, am pretty pissed off about judgements/random nonsense about my home life.

oh, and the 'warmth' thing was meaning 'emotional warmth' - blinking cheek.

thanks again for your replies. will post again once seen orthodontist here, but any other comments/advice etc gratefully rcvd!