When a dog moves its mouth as if chewing, grinding its teeth or wobbling its jaw, it is said that has bruxism Thisteeth grinding in dogs or bruxism is a clinical sign that arises as a result of various causes. The causes that make a dog do strange things with its mouth can be various, from external causes such as cold or stress, to painful, nervous internal diseases and those derived from poor hygiene.
Bruxism in dogs is usually accompanied by more clinical signs depending on the origin and a screeching sound due to contact between teeth. Subsequently, they can contact the soft tissue of the oral cavity and produce lesions that predispose to secondary infections. The causes are very different, so they can range from oral diseases to neurological, behavioral, environmental or gastrointestinal pathologies. So, if you're wondering why your dog does weird things with his mouth or what causes bruxism, in this article on our site we'll cover the most common causes separately.
Epilepsy
Epilepsy consists of an abnormal electrical activity of the brain due to the spontaneous depolarization of nerve cells, causing an epileptic seizure in which short-term alterations occur in the dog. It is the most frequent neurological alteration in the canine species. As a consequence of epilepsy, a dog may wobble its mouth, grind its teeth and move its jaw.
Epilepsy in dogs has the following phases:
- Prodromal phase: characterized by restlessness in the dog, precedes the seizure stage and lasts from minutes to days.
- Aura phase: a motor, sensory, behavioral or autonomic dysfunction occurs. It is a phase that lasts from seconds to minutes before the triggering of the seizure or epileptic attack.
- Seizure phase: consists of the seizure or epilepsy phase itself, and may be focalized if it affects only one part of the brain and epilepsy only occurs at the level of specific areas such as the face or a limb; or generalized if it affects the entire brain and the dog loses consciousness, with salivation, movements of all parts of the body and rapid involuntary contractions of the muscles.
- Postictal phase: As a result of brain exhaustion, dogs may be somewhat downcast, aggressive or have gait disturbances.
Periodontal disease
Periodontal disease occurs after the formation of bacterial plaque on the teeth of dogs because the accumulated food remains serve as a substrate for the oral bacteria of dogs, which begin to multiply rapidly forming a plaque. This plaque comes into contact with canine saliva and forms yellowish tartar that adheres to the teeth. Also, bacteria continue to multiply and feed, spreading to the gums, causing gum inflammation (gingivitis).
Dogs with periodontitis will have mouth pain that causes bruxism, that is, making strange movements with the mouth, as well as the gingivitis and halitosis (bad breath). In addition, as the disease progresses, it can cause loss of teeth and bacteria enter the blood circulation when they reach the blood vessels, causing septicemia and reaching internal organs of the dog, being able to give digestive, respiratory and cardiac signs.
Malocclusion
Prognathism in dogs consists of a dental malocclusion due to an inadequate alignment of the teeth, which makes the bite not be exact or well aligned, thus causing asymmetry of the bite (bite imperfecta) and associated clinical signs.
The malocclusion can be of three types:
- Prognathism: The lower jaw is more advanced than the upper jaw. This type of malocclusion is recognized as standard in certain canine breeds such as the boxer, the English bulldog or the pug.
- Brachygnathism: also called parrot's mouth, is an inherited disorder in which the upper jaw protrudes ahead of the lower jaw, being the upper incisors in front of the lower ones.
- Crooked Mouth: This is the worst form of malocclusion and is where one side of the jaw grows faster than the other. the other, twisting his mouth.
Associated clinical signs are grinding of the teeth during normal mouth movements, food coming out of the mouth when chewing, and predisposition to infections or injuries when chewing.
Dental pain
Like people, dogs with toothaches also chatter their teeth to "deflect the pain" almost reflexively.
Unlike people, dogs cannot communicate with us and sometimes bruxism is the only clinical sign that indicates a painful dental process, be it inflammatory, neoplastic, infectious or a dental fracture. When puppies begin to erupt their permanent teeth, some also grind their teeth.
Stress
Stressful situations and anxiety problems in dogs can cause them to manifest these sensations by grinding their teeth, especially while they sleep. Likewise, it is possible to observe that the dog seems to chew gum, constantly sticks out and sticks its tongue out or moves its mouth rapidly as a consequence, also, of this stress or anxiety.
Although dogs are less sensitive to stress than cats, they can also experience stress with similar situations, such as moving, introducing new animals or people, frequent noises, illness, anger or discomfort of the caregiver or changes in the grind. However, this reaction in dogs is much less common than in people.
Check the Things that stress dogs the most to avoid them as much as possible.
Gastrointestinal disease
Similar to what happens with tooth or gum pain, when a dog has pain due to a disease along the digestive tract it can manifest as bruxism.
Esophageal disorders such as esophagitis, gastritis, gastric or intestinal ulcers and other pathologies of the esophagus, stomach and intestine can cause a dog to do weird things with your mouth because of the pain and discomfort it causes.
Cold
The cold can greatly affect our dogs, being able to cause hypothermia and thus endanger their he alth. One of the first symptoms of hypothermia is tremors, including tremors of the teeth.
Subsequently, respiratory rate decreases, clumsiness, drowsiness, dry skin, lethargy, low blood pressure, heart rate decrease, hypoglycemia, depression, pupillary dilation, staring, depression, collapse and death.
