Is early Class II treatment appropriate?

Doc. MUDr. Olga Jedličková, CSc.  

Lecture of Honour - Thursday, September 30, 2010

Early treatment is still a widely discussed topic at numerous orthodontist meetings. However, we cannot ask whether early treatment is appropriate, but rather when it is so and when it is not. Multiple viewpoints need to be taken into account, not only the type of defect. The type of growth, bite depth, presence of crowding, bad habits, functional discrepancy and impact of soft tissues are also important.

The authoress monitored 80 patients with a protrusion defect and 22 patients with a retrusion defect whose treatment was launched upon the first phase of teeth replacement. The group of patients included those with successfully completed treatment that had been launched more than ten years ago.

The results show that in those cases where there is favourable growth with a deep bite and without the presence of crowding early treatment is truly appropriate, whereas in cases of unfavourable growth with crowding it is inefficient and hence inappropriate.