NEUROMUSCULAR DENTISTRY and Headaches: Highland Park Dentist has over 30 years experience in Neuromuscular Dentistry and Sleep

Neuromuscular Dentistry can give remarkable relief for Headaches, Migraines and othe symptoms of TemporoMandibular Disorders. Dr Shapira has 34 years experience in utilizing Neuromuscular Dentistry to treat numerous medical problems in addition to headaches. Dr Shapira is bringing this expertise and more to residents of Highland Park and to Chicago’s North Shore in his new Highland Park office. WWW.thinkbetterlife.com Dr Shapira was one of the first dentists in the country to do research and treat sleep apnea and snoring with oral appliances. He is now exploring the possibility of curing Sleep Apnea utilizing Epigenetic Orthodontics.

The very first commercial sleep apnea oral appliance was the Equalizer and was designed to be made utilizing Neuromuscular Dentistry. Dr Shapira became a visiting Asst Professor at Rush Medical School in the 1980’s where he utilized Neuromuscular Dentistry tools to compare the jaw positions of sleep apnea patients to normals and female TMJ and Headache patients.

Dr Shapira trained with Barney (Dr J) Jankelson, The Father of Neuromuscular Dentistry, Robert Jankelson, Barnneys son who was also a Prosthodontist and in Sleep with Dr Rosalind Cartwright who is considered the Mother of Dental Sleep Medicine and published the first papers on Oral Appliances and the Tongue Retaining Device. Dr Cartwright was Chairman of Psychology program and Sleep program and appointed Dr Shapira as a visiting asst professor in the 1980s thru 1991 for a research position and again in the late 1990s as an Asst Professor for treating patients and research.

His personal friends and mentor Dr Jim Garry was one of the world experts of pediatric airway development. Jim developed the NUK which was designed to duplicate the natural suckling that occured during breastfeeding . His original design was for an exerciser that would return normal growth to an infants jaw and create a healthy normal smile. Unfortunately he lost control of the device and its key use as a promoter of healthy growth was lost. Dr Shapira is starting a new program to wotk with pediatricians to establish habit control and normal growth patterns in children as young as three years old.

Dr Shapira also works closely with his close friend and Mentor Dr Barry Cooper who has the worlds largest ongoing database of patients evaluated and treated with Neurouscular Dentistry.

Dr Shapira research and early adaptation in Dental Sleep Medicine led him to a second career in teaching Dental Sleep Medicine to Dentists and Physicians from across the US and around the world. One of his students Dr Martha Cortes who is also a Neuromuscular Dentist introduced him the Epigenetic Orthodontics. Dr Shapira was Martha’s mentor in Sleep but she became his mentor in the field of Epigenetic Orthodontics.

Epigenetic Orthodontic utilizes the DNA Appliance and RNA appliance to treat Neuromuscular Disorder and Sleep Apnea. The ideal is to correct growth in children but the DNA Appliance allows non-surgical orthopedic Growth at any age and holds promise as the ultimate cure for many sleep apnea patients, especially those who are not morbidly obese. There are currently clinical cases in the literature where the DNA Appliance is Curing sleep apnea. Future research is required to move to larger prospective studies on curing sleep apnea.