TMJD stands for Temporomandibular Joint Dysfunction. It’s a condition that affects the temporomandibular joint, which connects your jawbone to your skull, as well as the muscles and ligaments surrounding it. It is sometimes referred to as TMD or TMJ.
Here’s a breakdown of what that means:
- Temporomandibular Joint (TMJ): These are the two joints that connect your lower jaw (mandible) to the temporal bone of your skull, located just in front of your ears. You can feel them by placing your fingers just in front of your ears and opening and closing your mouth. These joints are complex, allowing for both hinge-like and gliding motions, which are essential for speaking, chewing, and yawning.
- Dysfunction: This refers to problems or issues with the normal functioning of these joints and the surrounding muscles.
TMJD can cause pain and discomfort in the jaw joint and in the muscles that control jaw movement. It can also lead to a variety of other symptoms, including headache, jaw pain, facial pain, neck pain, jaw clicking, difficulty opening the jaw (trismus). TMJD can be caused by issues such as grinding or clenching the teeth.
What can Osteopathy do for TMJD?
Your osteopath can assess the movement of your TMJs and the structures that surround it to see what might be causing your issue. Taking a holistic and biopsychosocial approach, as well as looking at the area concerned, we consider other things that might be affecting the jaw – this could include dental work, injuries, tension in other parts of the body, or even stress, breathing patterns and lifestyle factors such as sleep patterns.
After a careful assessment and discussion with you to gain your consent, we will work with gentle techniques including soft tissue massage and gentle joint mobilisation to reduce tension, improve bloodflow and reduce inflammation and pain.
Usually a series of 4-6 treatments is advised, but very often improvement in symptoms is felt after the first treatment. You may be given some exercises to do at home to help support the treatment.
NB: While osteopathy and massage can be extremely helpful for many TMJ disorders, at SOC we always want you to receive the best care and so if osteopathy cannot help, we will always refer you to an appropriate medical consultant for another opinion.