Abstract
Statement of problem
As players of single-reed wind instruments such as the clarinet and saxophone are
likely to experience pain and trauma of the lower lip, a method to prevent these symptoms
without disturbing the music quality and performance is required.
Purpose
The purpose of this clinical study was to produce a custom music splint, an oral appliance
for the players of single-reed wind instruments, by using sports mouthguard sheet
materials and to determine its suppression effect on the pressure and pain of the
lower lip and teeth and on fatigue and pain of the jaw.
Material and methods
The soft type and soft and hard 2-layer type of sheet materials for sports mouthguards
were used to fabricate the music splints. Each type of material has 1-mm and 2-mm
thicknesses; therefore, 4 kinds of music splint were produced. The participants, students
who played wind instruments in university orchestras, were instructed to use each
music splint when playing the instruments for 1 week (for at least 3 hours for each
music splint) and to answer a questionnaire about the effect of each appliance. Eighteen
participants answered the questionnaire. Based on the usual usage of oral appliances
when playing instruments, the participants were classified into 2 groups; oral appliance
typically used (group OA) (n=7) and oral appliance not used (group noOA) (n=11). To
determine the effects of the 4 types of music splint, a multilevel linear regression
analysis was applied to evaluate the nested structure of the data (α=.05).
Results
The use of the music splint significantly relieved pressure and pain on the lower
lips. The soft type was more effective in group OA, and the thin type was more effective
in group noOA. The thin- and soft-type music splints were associated with significantly
better playing sensation and sound quality than other types of splint in both groups.
Conclusions
The thin- and soft-type music splints can be effective and useful for suppressing
oral symptoms when playing a single-reed wind instrument without disturbing the quality
of the performance.
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: August 04, 2021
Publication stage
In Press Corrected ProofFootnotes
The authors declare no conflict of interest.
This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.
Identification
Copyright
© 2021 by the Editorial Council for the Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry.
