My Family Dental Prevention
Custom Sports Mouthguards
Made from an impression of your own teeth, at all six clinics, so it fits well enough to actually get worn.
A knocked-out front tooth at fourteen is not one appointment, it is a lifetime of them. Custom mouthguards are made at all six of our clinics, including guards designed to fit over braces, and they are worth organising before the season rather than after the first knock.
Custom-fitted
Made from an impression of your own teeth
Juniors up
League, union, AFL, hockey, boxing
Made for braces
Not jammed on over them
All six clinics
Before the season, in your own town
North Queensland plays hard. League, union, AFL, hockey, boxing, and every one of them on a Saturday morning with somebody’s teeth in the way. A mouthguard is the least expensive thing in the bag and the only one protecting something that does not grow back.
Why the Shop-Bought One Fails
It is not really about the plastic. A boil-and-bite guard is softened in hot water and bitten into shape, which gets it approximately right. Approximately right means it shifts when it is knocked, it is thicker than it needs to be, and it makes talking and breathing harder than they should be during a game.
So it comes out at half time, then it stays in the bag, and by mid-season it is not being worn at all. Every mouthguard that is not in a mouth has a protection value of zero, regardless of what the packaging claimed.
A custom guard is made from an impression or a scan of the actual teeth. It stays where it is put, it is thinner where thin is fine and thicker where the impact goes, and it gets worn because wearing it is not a nuisance.
The Arithmetic Nobody Does
A front tooth lost at fourteen is not one repair. It is a temporary replacement through the growing years, a bridge or an implant once growth has finished, and then replacements of that work across a lifetime. It is decades of dentistry, and it starts with one collision in a game where the guard was in the bag.
If a tooth is knocked out, ring your nearest clinic straight away. Hold an adult tooth by the crown, not the root, do not scrub it, keep it in milk or in the player’s own saliva, and come in. Time matters enormously. There is more on our emergency page.
Braces
A player in braces needs a guard made to go over them. Brackets change the shape of the arch, and a rigid guard forced on top can cause injury of its own on impact. Tell us at booking, and it gets made accordingly.
Not the Same as a Night Guard
People often ask for a mouthguard when what they need is an occlusal splint for grinding at night. They are different appliances made for different forces: one absorbs a single hard impact, the other manages a long, repeated clenching load. If you are waking with a sore jaw or headaches, that is covered on our jaw pain page.
Where
- My Family Dental Townsville (Kirwan)
- My Family Dental Bohle Plains
- My Family Dental Ingham
- My Family Dental Innisfail
- My Family Dental Bowen
- My Family Dental Emerald
Important: A mouthguard reduces the risk of dental injury but cannot prevent every injury. Fit should be reviewed as children grow. Fees are provided in a written quote. Seek advice appropriate to your circumstances from a qualified health practitioner.
Common Questions
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, and the reason is not mainly the material. A boil-and-bite guard is moulded roughly to the teeth, so it moves, it is bulky, it makes talking and breathing harder, and it ends up in the bottom of the bag by round four. A custom one is made from an impression of your own teeth, so it stays put and gets worn. A mouthguard that is not being worn protects nothing.
Anyone playing a contact sport, from junior league up. It matters most for children and teenagers, because a front tooth lost at fourteen means crowns, and eventually implants, for the rest of their life. That is decades of dentistry starting from one tackle.
Yes, but they need a guard made for braces rather than a shop-bought one pushed on over them. Brackets change the shape of the arch and a rigid off-the-shelf guard can do damage of its own in a collision. Tell us they are in braces when you book.
An appointment for the impression or a scan, then it is made by the laboratory and you come back to collect and check the fit. Worth organising before the season rather than after the first knock.
For a growing child, usually yes, and more often than parents expect, because a guard that no longer fits the arch does not do its job. Bring it to the check-up and we will look at it.
From the Blog
Related Reading
Dental Mouthguards: The Pros and Cons
What a dental mouthguard actually does, the benefits and drawbacks of wearing one, and how to choose between stock, boil-and-bite and custom-fitted guards.
Read Article →Why Mouthguards Matter as Junior Sport Season Kicks Off
A look at custom versus store-bought mouthguards for North Queensland kids and adults getting back into sport this season.
Read Article →Mouthguards for Contact Sport: What North Queensland Families Should Know
A guide to custom-fitted mouthguards for footy, netball and other contact sports, and why they matter for North Queensland's junior athletes.
Read Article →Ready to Book Your Visit?
Book a visit at your nearest My Family Dental clinic: we’ll talk through your options and what it costs.