Airway Health in Infants, Children, and Adults
Learn more about sleep-disordered breathing.
Infants
A physical condition that limits the use of the tongue is called a tongue-tie. This restriction often causes a range of issues and affects around 20% of the population. A lip-tie, on the other hand, is a condition where the upper lip is restricted and cannot move normally. It can cause difficulty with nursing, make it harder to brush the top teeth, and can also lead to a gap in the teeth.
The tongue and lip are made up of a very complex group of muscles and are important for all oral functions. For this reason, having a tongue- or lip-tie can lead to nursing, feeding, dental, speech, sleep, or breathing problems. Problems can even persist into adulthood with sleep issues, headaches, neck pain, shoulder pain, and speech problems.
Baby’s Symptoms:
- Poor latch
- Poor weight gain
- Reflux or frequent spitting up
- Frequent gassiness and fussiness
- Clicking or smacking noises when eating
- Dribbling milk out of mouth
- Frustration when eating
- Inability to hold a pacifier
- Prolonged nursing or bottle-feeding sessions
Contact Newnan Periodontics and Dental Implants for more information on this important mouth-body connection.
Children
There are many children who have difficulties related to tongue-ties and lip-ties, but unfortunately, these conditions are often not identified until later in life. They can cause speech and feeding difficulties, sleep issues, and a wide-range of other concerns.
Understanding the early years of your child’s life is very important for their growth and development. By age 2, 53% of the upper and lower jaw growth has occurred and 80% of the size of the skull has developed, with the other 20% developing from age 2-17. Dr. Gil strongly believes in early intervention to allow proper growth in young children. As children advance through a sequence of growth stages, proper nasal-breathing and tongue function is crucial for airway/jaw development and overall health. Normal, fully developed jaws will allow an anatomical structural form that can support a full set of teeth with no crowding or crookedness, no TMJ problems, a healthy oral airway, proper tongue space and an ideal craniofacial foundation for your child to thrive. This is where optimal health begins and these conditions perpetuate excellent health.
References:
Contact Newnan Periodontics and Dental Implants for more information on this important mouth-body connection.
Adults
There are many oral manifestations of disordered breathing such as Bruxism, scalloped or large tongue, enlarged uvula, dry mouth, narrow palate, worn/chipped/cracked teeth.
Dr. Gil will screen your airway as a part of your comprehensive oral evaluation and share newest research findings on the topic.
- Sixty million American adults have sleep or wakefulness disorder
- Snoring Remediation with Oral Appliance Therapy potentially reverses Cognitive Impairment (Schramn et al 2021)
- Lingual frenuloplasty with myofunctional therapy: Exploring safety and efficacy in 348 cases (Zaghi et al, 2019)
Contact Newnan Periodontics and Dental Implants for more information on this important mouth-body connection.