TMJ or The Temporomandibular Joint are the two joints which connect the lower jaw to the temporal bone at the side of the head. If you place your fingers just in front of your ears and open your mouth, you can feel the joint on each side of the head.
Because these joints are flexible, the jaw can move smoothly up and down and side to side, enabling us to talk, chew and yawn. When the TMJ is not functioning normally and it is not within its physiological limits, it creates a condition called TMD.

TMD or Temporomandibular Dysfunction, is a group of conditions resulting from not having a normal function or 'comfortable' positioning of the TMJ, and will present as a cycle of pain, muscle spasms and jaw problems.

When teeth are missing, out of alignment, crowded or misshaped, chewing and biting can not be achieved in a balanced way, so the TMJ and the muscles of chewing try to compensate for this unbalanced movement which results in symptoms that will confirm the presence of TMD.

Temporomandibular Joint Disorder (TMD) is not just a disorder, but a group of conditions, often painful, that affect the jaw joint or Temporomandibular Joint (TMJ) and the muscles that control chewing.

TMD falls into three main categories:
1. Myofascial pain, the most common form of TMD, which is discomfort or pain in the muscles that control jaw functions and the neck and shoulder muscles.
2. Internal derangement of the joint meaning a dislocated or displaced disc or injury to the condyle (the rounded part at the end of the jaw bone).
3. Degenerative joint disease such as Osteoarthritis or Rheumatoid Arthritis in the jaw joint.