Tongue Tie

We such a lot of babies with feeding issues I thought it would be a good idea to do a post about this as its International Breastfeeding Week. Its hard to keep things short sometimes….

Tongue-tie is when the baby’s tongue is tethered to the bottom of the mouth causing difficulty sticking its tongue out beyond the gum or in milder cases beyond the lower lip. Some babies with this can breastfeed perfectly, others have difficulty and a few also have difficulty bottle-feeding.

It can result in the inability to move the tongue in a normal way, affecting the ability to attach and suck effectively, causing nipple feeding rather than breastfeeding, sore nipples and poor infant weight gain.

The signs and symptoms are difficulties: making a wide mouth; latching on efficiently and maintaining latch; poor strength of suck or ability to maintain suck; slips off easily; clamps onto the nipple with the gums causing excruciating pain and lipstick shaped nipples.

Naturally the baby gets frustrated and: pulls on and off; feeds for short bursts, gets tired and stops or goes to sleep; remains hungry and wants to feed almost constantly; finds it hard to maintain a good seal so the baby takes down a lot of air which can make the baby very windy and may increase irritability and colic; dribbles milk; the feed takes two to three times as long.

Solutions

NHS – Midwives, health visitors and doctors are usually the first people to pick up a tongue-tied baby and refer it to have it snipped.

Breastfeeding counsellors, breastfeeding groups and lactation consultants may also identify and refer to the NHS options, as well as give information, advice and support on technique.

Osteopaths – we see lots of babies with all kinds of feeding difficulties in our practice. Occasionally we are the first to diagnose a tongue-tie and refer back to the NHS. We also often find there are muscle tensions or strains involving the jaw that may also be contributing to feeding difficulties and can originate from the birth process of both natural and caesarean births.

If you have a baby that has difficulty settling or is uncomfortable, why not give us a call to see if osteopathy might help. For a friendly informal chat or to book an appointment, call us on 0117 923 1138

Untreated a few tongue ties do persist and may cause speech or other problems, but this won’t really be apparent until the child is at least three years old. If there is a problem, the tongue-tie can be divided under a very short general anaesthetic. Most children with a tongue-tie and a speech problem improve following division.

Jeni

6 August 2013