Epigenetic Appliances
Start Thriving Appliance (STA)
Dr. Felix Liao’s appliance for redeveloping an impaired mouth — made exclusively by Gergen’s Orthodontic Laboratory.
RemovableScan or impression
Learn moreStart a case
Epigenetics · Dr. Felix Liao
Start Thriving Appliance
Dr. Felix Liao's appliance for redeveloping an impaired mouth — made exclusively by Gergen's Orthodontic Laboratory.
Dr. Felix Liao is a pioneer of airway-centred dentistry and the originator of Impaired Mouth Syndrome and Holistic Mouth Solutions. He holds an engineering degree from Brown, a DDS from Case School of Dental Medicine, board certification from the American Board of General Dentistry, and Mastership in both the Academy of General Dentistry and the International Academy of Biological Dentistry and Medicine.
The Start Thriving Appliance grew out of that work. Dr. Liao designed it as a way for a patient to test-drive and then adopt Holistic Mouth Solutions — a custom appliance that gently repositions the jaw, tongue and airway structures to restore oral posture and breathing function.
The problem it is aimed at is structural rather than symptomatic: a retruded lower jaw, tongue in the wrong place, collapsed arches, obstructed breathing at night. Dr. Liao's approach is to redevelop that infrastructure using epigenetic appliances, integrating with cranial work and myofunctional therapy where a case calls for it.
We are the exclusive fabricator. Every STA is built here, to the prescribing doctor's specification, and we will talk a case through with you before it goes on the bench.
What an impaired mouth looks like
Dr. Liao's starting point is that a great many adult complaints trace back to the same structural problem: a mouth too small for the tongue. A retruded lower jaw, arches that never developed to full width, a tongue with nowhere to rest but back into the airway. The symptoms show up far from the mouth — fatigue, headaches, neck and back pain, broken sleep — which is why they so often get treated one at a time and never resolve.
Redevelop rather than compensate
The epigenetic approach treats that as something to redevelop rather than work around. Open the arches, give the tongue somewhere to go, restore oral posture, and let the structure change. The Start Thriving Appliance is how a patient begins that — Dr. Liao designed it so the approach can be test-driven before a full course of treatment is committed to.
Where the laboratory fits
We are the exclusive fabricator. Every STA is built at our bench to the prescribing doctor's specification, from your scan or impressions. Wirework is hand-formed and adjusted on the model, acrylic is processed and finished, and the appliance is checked against the records before it ships. If anything on the prescription is open to interpretation, a technician calls the practice rather than guessing.
What Dr. Liao's programme addresses
- Chronic fatigue or low energy
- TMJ pain, facial tension and headaches
- Poor sleep and sleep-disordered breathing
- Mouth breathing and nasal congestion
- Postural issues, neck and back discomfort
- Developmental issues in teenagers — crowding, sleep-related behaviour
Built at Gergen’s
- Fabrication
- Exclusive to Gergen's Orthodontic Laboratory
- Fit
- Custom to the patient, adjustable as the case develops
- Submission
- Intraoral scan or conventional impressions
- Records
- Both arches, a bite registration, and the prescribing doctor's design notes
- Questions
- Talk it through with the laboratory before you send
How it works, per Dr. Liao
Jaw alignment
Aligning the jaws to improve bite and neuromuscular function
Airway
Expanding the airway to promote nasal breathing and reduce sleep-disordered breathing
Tongue posture
Encouraging proper tongue posture, which supports cranial development and facial structure
TMJ
Relieving strain on the TMJ, neck and upper spine by correcting the bite relationship