Design and development of oral appliance for obstructive sleep apnea

With the development of medical technology, snoring gradually has been attended in recent years. Snoring is usually mistaken for the physiological phenomenon because the body is too tired. Actually, snoring is one of symptoms in obstructive sleep apnea. Present treatments for obstructive sleep apnea include continuous positive air pressure, oral appliances and performing surgery. There are more than 20 different types of current commercially available mandibular advancement devices (MAD). Although there are so many different types of MAD available in the market, these designs are often not flexible enough to be adjusted to fit these devices to all possible cases. The aim of this study was to design and develop a new type of mandibular advancement device which used friction effect to achieve mandibular forward, and ensure it would not slide back during sleeping. The new type of mandibular advancement device could be quickly adjusted, and had 3-degree of freedom. ANSYS software was used to simulate whether the new design was strong enough. From the simulation it was found that the new innovative design was reliable and easy to be used for obstructive sleep apnea patients.