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You and Your Child
Pacifiers
All parents want their child
to be happy, healthy and content. Infants and newborns cannot speak or
communicate their unhappiness, hunger, etc. and frequently verbalize their
feelings by crying. Frequently, parents give their child a baby bottle
or pacifier to pacify or quiet the baby. All current conventional pacifiers
potentially cause ill side effects with constant or prolonged usage. These
ill side effects are tongue thrust habits, constricted palates, dental
crossbites which lead to distorted dental and skeletal growth, open dental
bites, poor lip seals and potentially promote middle ear infections in
infants and toddlers. I have been performing research and clinical studies
since 1995 on the relationship between dental occlusion, pacifiers, and
otitis media (middle ear infection) in children. I have developed a painless,
reversible, and effective dental procedure in children between the ages
of thirty (30) months and sixty (60) months to reduce the frequency and
pain of ear infections in children. This technique is inexpensive and
approximately 80% - 100% effective in reducing or eliminating ear infections
in infants and toddlers. This could be a very good alternative to long
term antibiotic therapy or placement of ear tubes in your child. I recently
wrote an article published in the Journal of Clinical Pediatric Dentistry:
Volume 22, Number 3/1998. The article is entitled "Minimizing
Otitis Media by Manipulating the Primary Dental Occlusion Case Report".
I have developed and received a patent for a new and
improved pacifier for infants and children. My pacifier is called a GyBy (which is an
Acronym for Guide Your Bite Yourself). It is
designed to incorpurate the principles of an orthodontic appliance to
promote normal oral development and swallowing patterns in the infant. All
current pacifiers potentially cause poor oral developement if used
improperly or excessively. Click on the articles section of this website
the go to pacifiers to read a summary of the scientific article on all
current pacifiers. I am having prototypes made and hope to market it in
the near future. I am giving the prototypes to my patients to wean them
off their conventional pacifiers.
If your child wants to suck their thumb or finger, offer
your child a pacifier. You should stop pacifier usage at age one year as
well as the baby bottle, but you certainly cannot cut off
your child's thumb at age one year.
Pacifier usage after age six months is nothing more than a habit, a bad
habit. Infants lose their inate sucking needs at age 5 - 6 months. I
recommend that you wean your child from the pacifier, "Cold Turkey", at
age 6 - 9 months of age. The longer the child becomes attached to or
dependent upon the pacifier, the more difficult weaning becomes. The
child must see the parent throw away the pacifier "outside of the home" so
that the child knows that it is gone. I will buy pacifiers
from the toddler for one dollar in my
office.
If you want more information, please feel free to contact us
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