Ankyloglossia (tongue-tied)

Ankylogossia is a condition where the bottom of the tongue is attatched to the floor of the mouth.  How it is stuck is by the band of tissue underneath the tongue called the lingual frenulum.

 

 

 

It is unknown why this happens.

 

 

What are the signs?

 

- Irratibility of fussyness, even after feeding.

 

- Unable to or having difficulty creating or maintaining suction.  For an infant,they become tired in 1 or 2 minutes, or fall asleep before eating enough.

 

- Poor weight gain or loss.

 

- Unable to latch onto a nipple.  Chews instead.

 

- Difficulty swallowing.

 

- Lack of speech.

 

- Feeding issues.

 

- When examining tongue (if hard to tell underneath), does the tip of the tongue have a dip to it like a V? 

 

- Excessive spewing from birth to typically around 6 months.

 

 

What complications can become of this?

 

- Problems with teeth.

 

- Limited mobility, which effects simple tasks like blowing outwards or sucking in through a straw.

 

Because of the limited mobility, certain issues come into play like:

 

- Swallowing.

- Feeding.

- Speech.

 

 

What can be done about Ankyloglossia?

 

- If you have concerns about your child being tongue-tied, talk to you peditrician and have it checked out.

 

- Depending on the age, surgery may be an option. 

 

- For severe cases, surgical reconstruction called z-plasty may be done, which is done to prevent scar tissue from forming.

 

- If surgery is not an option, therapy, therapy, therapy.  Speech or Occupational therapists can help.

 

Some tips that I had to do with my son relating to therapy are:

 

- Make sure to stretch out the tongue.  You can try to grab the tip of the tongues with your thumb and index finger and slightly pull the tongue.  Not hard and not where you are hurting the tongue, just so that you are able to begin stretching it.

 

- Face your child and stick out your tongue and move it around (outside of your mouth) so that they can see the mobility.  For a while they might just examine what you are doing, but it will get to the point that they will start mimicking.

 

- Leave a hand held mirror around so that they can pick it up or give them a mirror, so that they can examine there own mouth.  Sitting behind the mirror and letting them check themselves out and then have them pay attention to you with your own tongue will give you some good progress.

 

- Let your child stick their fingers in their mouth and play with their tongue, just make sure you watch how dirty their hands get!  Wash their hands frequently.  Allowing them to do this, lets them stretch out their tongue comfortably.

 

- Like the tongue stretching excercises, do lots of mouth movements and talk with your tongue sticking out, make sure to do a lot of exaggeration.  This will not only help with the stretching, but also help with speech.

 

 

 

Though at this current moment in time we are still doing the therapies, we have had some aweome progress!  We started doing these tips almost 2 years ago.  When we started we had NO mobility with the tongue and Adrian was making NO sounds.  He is currently starting to form words and eats like a champ.  Also we have noticed that with the stretching his lingual frenulum is no longer all the way at the tip of his tongue and it seems like we will be able to avoid surgery.

 

 

I hope that the tips and the information on Ankylogossia gives you some valid information and help.