A Future of Orthodontics

Every profession likes to justify its existence by comparing itself to another it feels inferior.  Orthodontists complain about general dentists doing incomplete orthodontics.  GP's complain about orthodontists with a narrow point of view.  Recently, an ortho colleague sent me an article about encouraging GP's to do orthodontics.  Here is my reply:

Over the past couple of years, I've met a number of dentists doing orthodontics. I've been unpleasantly surprised to find that many are very accomplished.  Even more so, some have a conception of facial growth, tooth movement, and mechanotherapy that is very different from ours.  For instance, as orthodontists, we generally see malocclusion as the problem to be solved.  However, many look at malocclusion as a symptom of a greater problem, and seek to solve THAT.   Their view takes a broader view of the face to include the formation and the function of "functional matrices" that Moss talked about: swallowing, chewing, breathing, sleeping, etc. This point of view comes closer to looking at a "medical" view of dentistry, and frankly, that is probably where dentistry is moving.  As techniques become simpler and "mid-level providers" come into play, which I believe they will, dentists will have to play more than must a mechanical role in oral health.  We see that in perio. We see that in TM problems. We see that in sleep medicine.  I believe we are going to see that in ortho, too.  Unfortunately, unless something changes, it may not be the orthodontist leading the way.