Occlusal Splints
Occlusal Splints Built to a Defined Bite
An occlusal splint answers a clinical question: what does this occlusion do when you control it? We fabricate hard acrylic splints mounted to your records in our California, Colorado, and Texas labs, with contacts placed where your concept demands them, not where the vacuum former left them.
What Is an Occlusal Splint?
An occlusal splint is a full-coverage appliance in hard acrylic that holds the mandible at a defined bite position and gives the occlusion a controlled, adjustable surface. Where a night guard simply absorbs parafunction, a dental occlusal splint works the other direction: it organizes contacts, deprograms engrained muscle patterns, and lets you observe what the joint and musculature do when the interferences are gone. That makes it equal parts treatment and instrument. Wear marks on hard acrylic can be read at recall like a flight recorder, which is why the material choice is not negotiable for diagnostic work.
When to Prescribe an Occlusal Splint
Classic entry points: deprogramming before an equilibration, stabilizing an occlusion you intend to rebuild, testing a new vertical dimension before committing full-arch ceramics, and managing an occlusal splint for bruxism where the goal is scheme control rather than pure protection of the enamel. If joint and muscle findings lead the case instead, that is splint-therapy territory with its own records and its own page in our program. Either way the diagnosis stays chairside with you; we build to it, never around it.
Materials & Options
- Materials
- Hard processed & milled splint acrylics (brand-name materials)
- Options
- Full-coverage designs, upper or lower; scheme & vertical per Rx
- Turnaround
- 7 working days
- Rush Available
- Yes, contact us for scheduling
- Delivery
- Nationwide UPS/FedEx
- Digital Files
- STL, OBJ accepted
How We Process Your Occlusal Splint Case
- 1
Send Your Case
Both arches plus a bite record in the position you intend
- 2
Articulate & Plan
Models mounted to your records, contact scheme planned per Rx
- 3
Process & Balance
Hard acrylic processed or milled, occlusion balanced and polished
- 4
Deliver
Shipped nationwide against your seat appointment
Contact Us
Frequently Asked Questions
Put a Splint Case on Our Bench
New accounts: we respond within 24 hours. Pickup & nationwide delivery available.
Open a Lab AccountWhat does an occlusal splint cost?
Occlusal splint cost is quoted through your dentist, whose fee covers records, adjustments, and follow-up alongside the appliance itself. On the laboratory side, design complexity and material drive the fee more than size does. Accounts receive our appliance fee schedule on request, and your practice can walk you through the treatment total.
Occlusal splint before and after: what should change?
Occlusal splint before and after differences are something your dentist evaluates over weeks, not a single dramatic moment. Typical observations include steadier muscle patterns, more reproducible bite records, and wear marks that migrate to where the splint design placed them. Every case differs, so treat the appliance as part of an ongoing assessment your dentist leads.
Do I need an occlusal splint or just a night guard?
If the goal is protecting teeth from grinding, a night guard usually serves. If your dentist is investigating or changing how your bite functions, the adjustable, precisely balanced surface of a splint is the right instrument. It is a treatment-plan decision: our occlusal guards page covers the protective side, and your dentist knows which question your mouth is asking.
What about splints that cover only the front teeth?
Anterior-only designs exist and have a specific logic: they separate the back teeth completely and quiet the closing muscles with minimal acrylic. They also carry their own indications and cautions, which is why we build them as a distinct appliance line. Our NTI night guards page covers that category; your dentist will know whether partial coverage fits your case.
Hard Acrylic, Readable Results
The material argument for a custom occlusal splint is diagnostic, not just mechanical. Hard acrylic holds a polished, dimensionally stable table that records every excursion the patient makes; at recall you read facets like a log file and adjust with intent. Soft materials feel friendlier at delivery and then erase the very information the therapy needs, while encouraging some patients to chew the appliance instead of resting on it. We process and mill hard splint acrylics that tolerate repeated chairside correction, because an appliance that cannot be adjusted precisely was never really an instrument, whatever the invoice calls it.
Centric Relation, Captured and Kept
Most splint remakes begin with a record nobody trusted. Whatever deprogramming method your protocol uses before capturing centric relation, what we need is the record you believe, plus scans or impressions of both arches. We mount to that record and keep the mounting on file for the case, so a later refinement starts from the same reference instead of a fresh guess. If the bite record and the models disagree, you get a call before fabrication. A splint built on a doubted record just postpones the argument to the seat appointment, with the patient numb and the schedule watching.
Occlusal Splint vs Night Guard: Different Jobs, Similar Silhouettes
The occlusal splint vs night guard confusion is understandable, since both are clear, removable, and worn at night. The difference is intent. A guard shields enamel from parafunction and asks nothing of the occlusion; a splint holds a prescribed mandibular position and organizes contacts to a scheme. The same logic settles the occlusal splint vs mouth guard question patients bring in from search engines. We fabricate both categories on dedicated lines, and the Rx wording steers the bench: ask for protection and you get durable simplicity, ask for a scheme and you get an adjustable instrument. Prescribe by job description and each appliance stays honest about its purpose.
Before the Big Case: Splints as Pre-Restorative Insurance
The cheapest full-mouth rehearsal available is a splint. Testing an altered vertical or a reorganized scheme in acrylic before you commit to ceramics turns assumptions into observations: the patient wears the proposed occlusion for weeks, and the follow-up records tell you whether the plan holds. When the definitive crown and bridge work begins, the validated position travels with the case file to the same benches that will mill the ceramics, along with the mounting and every note collected on the way. That continuity between splint and restoration is where having one laboratory for both quietly pays for itself: nothing gets re-explained, re-guessed, or lost between vendors.
Milled and 3D Printed Occlusal Splints
Digital splint fabrication has earned its place. A milled or 3d printed occlusal splint offers homogeneous material, reproducible thickness, and a stored design we can re-produce or modify without new records within the retention window. Send STL or OBJ files with the bite record through the portal and the case starts the day it arrives. Analog impressions remain welcome, and either route passes the same articulator check before shipping, because the fabrication method changes the tooling, never the standard the occlusion is held to. For serial appliances the digital file also keeps thickness and scheme identical from one delivery to the next.
The Appliance Bench Behind Every Occlusal Splint
Splint work rides on the same appliance department that has served practices since 1994: family-owned, three labs, one standard from Rosemead to Round Rock. Cases arrive digitally through the portal or physically by prepaid label and scheduled pickup, and both roads end at the same articulator. Prescribers running structured occlusal programs get consistency across serial appliances and a technician who remembers the last case rather than a queue number that forgets it. Alongside splints, the bench builds the whole appliances range, from protective guards to retention. Open a lab account, send the records you trust, and put a disciplined splint between your diagnosis and your next big restorative decision.