Shifting the Focus in Orthodontic Practice—William M. Hang DDS MSD—Face Focused

William M. Hang, MSD, has been an orthodontist for 47 years now. He was trained in a conventional way like everyone else; taught to focus on the straightening of the teeth and not pay much attention to the structure of the face. But in the early 80s, he began noticing differences between the way his patient’s faces looked before and after tooth extractions, realizing many of these patients were made worse off by the procedure.

He also started hearing about the procedure leading to problems such as chronic headaches and neck pain.

That was when he started travelling the world in search of a new way of doing things.

In 1989, he started reopening extraction spaces for people who had previously had bicuspid teeth removed, and this was resulting in restored facial balance and relief from headaches and neck pain. For the past 20 years, Dr. Hang’s focus has been on another issue associated with all of the problems that extractions and traditional orthodontic approaches can cause: breathing problems and sleep apnea.

He joins the podcast today to offer an in-depth look at what’s wrong with the traditional approach in orthodontics, the effects of retraction, the growing number of children being diagnosed with sleep apnea and why this is, the possible misdiagnosis of sleep apnea as ADHD in children, why the advent of agriculture marked the beginning of the development of the facial features we see today, a technique called orthotropics, myofunctional therapy, the importance of optimizing facial growth in young children, the services offered at his practice, Face Focused, and so much more.

Press play for the full conversation and visit https://facefocused.com/ to learn more about Dr. Hang’s practice.

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