A night guard does not stop you grinding. It stops your teeth paying for it.
Most people who grind their teeth have no idea they do it. It happens in sleep, and the damage arrives slowly enough that no day feels worse than the one before. People find out because someone else tells them — a partner who hears it, or a dentist who sees wear that does not match your age.
Bruxism is the clinical name for clenching and grinding. Some do it at night, some awake, plenty do both. It wears through enamel, and enamel does not grow back. A properly made occlusal guard puts a replaceable layer of acrylic between your teeth so the wear happens to the guard instead. Worth doing — and worth being clear about what it does not fix.
The Signs a Dentist Spots First
By the time grinding is obvious to you it has been going on for years. This is what we look for at a routine dental examination:
- Flattened cusps — pointed chewing surfaces worn to a plateau
- Wear facets, shiny flat patches that match up when your teeth meet
- Cracks and craze lines through the enamel of front teeth
- Notching at the gum line, called cervical abfraction, where flexing under load chips enamel away
- A scalloped edge along the sides of the tongue
- A pale ridged line inside the cheeks at the level of your bite
- Teeth sensitive to cold with no decay to explain it
- Restorations that keep chipping or coming loose
What you notice yourself is vaguer: a jaw that aches on waking, headaches at the temples, teeth tender early in the day, or a partner who has started sleeping elsewhere.
What Untreated Grinding Costs
Enamel is finite. Once grinding wears through into the dentine underneath, the tooth wears faster, becomes sensitive and eventually needs covering. That means a crown on a tooth with nothing wrong with it except attrition, and doing that to several teeth is a significant bill. A crack reaching the nerve means root canal treatment or extraction, and a tooth that splits below the gum line usually cannot be saved.
Grinding also breaks existing dental work. Fillings fracture, crowns come off, porcelain veneers chip, and composite bonding on a front edge does not survive heavy clenching. If you have paid for cosmetic work and grind, protection decides whether it lasts five years or fifteen.
Custom Guard Versus the Drugstore Version
A boil-and-bite guard from the pharmacy beats nothing for a short period. It is soft, thick and shaped by you biting into warm plastic, so it rarely covers every tooth evenly. Where it is thick it props your jaw open further than it needs to be, which can make muscle pain worse. Where it does not seat properly it can let teeth move over months of nightly wear — the principle Invisalign uses deliberately, happening by accident.
A custom guard is made from a scan of your own teeth, in a controlled material and thickness, then adjusted so your bite meets evenly across it. It stays put, does not shift teeth, and lasts years rather than months.
Hard, Soft and Dual-Laminate
- Hard acrylic — the standard for genuine grinders. Durable, adjustable, and it does not encourage chewing.
- Soft — comfortable at first and fine for light clenchers, but it wears through faster. It also invites chewing, which raises muscle activity rather than reducing it.
- Dual-laminate — soft against the teeth, hard outside. A middle ground when comfort is the barrier.
We will tell you which suits you, and why.
How We Make One
- An examination, to confirm the wear is grinding rather than erosion, decay or a bite problem that needs sorting first.
- A digital scan or impressions of both arches, and a record of how your teeth meet.
- Fabrication at a dental laboratory, usually a couple of weeks.
- A fitting, to seat the guard and adjust the biting surface until contact is even. That step separates a guard you wear from one that lives in a drawer.
Care and Lifespan
Rinse it in cold water and brush it with plain soap — not toothpaste, which is abrasive enough to dull the surface. Keep it away from heat, hot water, car dashboards and dogs, which eat them with real enthusiasm. A hard guard usually lasts several years. Bring it to your hygiene visits so we can read the wear on it — it tells us more about how hard you grind than you can.
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A Guard Protects Teeth. It Does Not Treat the Cause.
Being straight about this is more useful than pretending otherwise. Nobody fully understands why people grind. Stress and anxiety are strongly associated with it, as are disturbed sleep, late caffeine, evening alcohol, nicotine and some medications, including certain antidepressants. If your grinding is stress-driven, a guard protects your teeth while you deal with the stress somewhere else. Any product claiming to stop the clenching itself is overselling.
When Grinding Is a Breathing Problem
There is a recognised association between sleep bruxism and sleep-disordered breathing. Some people grind in response to airway obstruction, and there a guard treats the symptom while the real problem carries on. If you snore heavily, wake unrefreshed, have been told you stop breathing in your sleep, or fall asleep during the day, say so before we make you anything. That belongs with sleep apnea and dentistry, and may mean a referral to your physician rather than a prescription to our laboratory.
Jaw Pain and TMJ
Many people with jaw pain also grind, and a guard helps a fair proportion of them by reducing muscle activity and unloading the joint. It does not help everyone, and the evidence does not support promising it will. A jaw that locks, clicks painfully or will not open fully needs assessing rather than treating with an appliance and hoping.
Cost and Coverage
A custom guard costs more than the pharmacy version and less than a single crown. Against the work it prevents, it is one of the better-value things we make.
Most extended health plans cover part of an occlusal guard, often under a separate limit with a replacement interval of several years. We can direct bill your insurer where your plan allows, and send a predetermination first so you know the number before we start. If you are covered under the Canadian Dental Care Plan, check whether a guard is included and whether it needs preauthorisation rather than assuming either way. Ranges and payment options are on fees and payment, with a written estimate before anything is made.
Frequently Asked Questions
Will a night guard stop me grinding my teeth?
No. It protects the biting surfaces and often eases morning jaw soreness, but the grinding continues. Anyone telling you a guard cures bruxism is selling something.
Is a night guard the same as a retainer?
No. A retainer holds teeth where orthodontic treatment put them. A night guard is thicker and built to absorb force. If you have had braces and grind, you may need both.
Get Your Bite Checked
If you wake with a sore jaw, your teeth look shorter than they were, or your dental work keeps breaking, let us look at the wear pattern. If you do not need a guard, we will say so.
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