Tongue tie - to not snip

[JL642]

Morning. I am very confused about tongue tie. To snip or not to snip?

My EBF baby is nearly 5 months now. Feeding fine and gaining weight ok. Maybe her feeding is slower and more often than other babies but I’m not sure for sure as my first DC.

I asked the GP to check for tongue tie at 8 weeks and she said no tongue tie. My DC’s tongue tie was not then identified until 13 weeks by a lactation consultant. I was told I was too late to get DC’s tongue tie snipped on the NHS at that point. The lactation consultant said DC’s latch was fine (I have to be on the ball and double check each latch in case DC doesn’t open mouth wide enough but generally fine).

Given Dc is feeding ok do I need to pay to get her TT snipped privately?

I have seen other articles saying TT can impact sleep, breathing speech potentially. Does this mean I should snip?

DC doesn’t sleep brilliantly but I expect that’s more because she is so young and BF and maybe it’s just her. She’s generally happy although is a Velcro baby. I assume that’s her temperament and not because of the TT.

Surely plenty of FF babies don’t get their tongue tie even noticed (and consequently not snipped)?

My mother BF two babies in the 90s and hasn’t even heard of TT. We are both fine. Not sure TT was such a thing then?

Interested in anyone who didn’t snip the TT.

I just spoke to my husband whose a dentist. He said it depends on the severity of the TT but it seems like your child's feeding well? He said if there's no issues you could wait until they're older and have LA.

He said he wouldn't want anyone doing it on our baby who is 15 months if it wasn't impacting her life right now

So his advice is basically he'd get it snipped but when they're old enough to have LA, If it's not causing any current issues

My baby is 10 week old and breastfed, he's got tounge tie too! He has been looked at by hospital when born, midwife when discharged and health visitor and all said he's fine he can touch top of his mouth when crying ect so won't cut it.

Why has it got to be nonsense?

What do you think affects facial development?

Would the placement of a large muscle that applies pressure not have any effect on the structure around it?

I'm not sure if it just depends on feb surgeon but mine would only do if under GA.y child was 11 years though

It absolutely does. My parents spent a five figure sum on corrective orthodontic work as I had a high narrow palate caused by tongue tie. When the tongue is tied it doesn’t sit high in the mouth and shape the palate correctly.

My teeth were utterly horrendous aged 11, I’ve also got hypodontia due to my upper jaw not being big enough for adult teeth.

OP, we haven’t snipped our daughter’s tongue tie but I would recommend finding someone to assess her oral & tongue function before you make that decision.

Our daughter’s problems with tongue tie only started after weaning. No issues breastfeeding but weaning and sleep was a whole new ballgame.

Thank you. Yes, no issues at present as far as I am aware.

I think you are scaremongering. Obviously there are lots of reasons why people might have problems with their teeth and jaws but by definition a tongue tie might mean the tongue is more controlled within the mouth so don’t see why it would be responsible for making teeth crooked etc

I'm a speech therapist
I've never actually seen a child where their tongue tie was impacting on their speech - any difficulties with speech were actually linked to other reasons. It's abit of a controversial area - vast majority of children with tongue tie do not have speech issues. Occasionally/rarely there might be issues saying certain sounds when they're older like "L" where tongue tip needs to touch roof of mouth. There's also no way of telling if intervention on tongue tie in babies impacts on later speech.

So all in all I wouldn't worry about speech at the moment as long as baby is feeding well and intervention only would really be indicated now if you felt there was a functional impact on feeding

https://alderhey.nhs.uk/application/files/4015/4687/7790/TongueTieeLeaflet--PIAG_0028.pdf

This is useful information

I’m sorry that you think I am scaremongering. If you look at my post earlier in the thread you’ll see that I am posting from experience of issues with tongue tie for both my children. We are currently having professional help from a speech therapist that has been trained in how the mouth functions. I do not believe that I have done anything other than write about our experience and then ask questions to see if you have anything to back up your claim that the idea of there being potential consequences to a tongue tie as nonsense.

You describe tongue tie as leading to the tongue being more controlled within the mouth. I think a better description would be more restricted. The tongue is held at the base of the mouth by the tie. It should rest on the roof of the mouth, not the base.

If I try and hold my tongue to the base of my my mouth and inhale through my nose, I cannot take anywhere near as deep a breath as I can when my tongue rests on the roof of my mouth. Try it and see.

For us, it has led to problems with speech and with eating. It’s possible it has led to breathing issues, but that’s really difficult to know.

Obviously, there are different degrees of tongue tie, as well as different locations. I expect there are other factors that will have an impact on how tongue tie affects someone as they grow up. It’s impossible to know the impact long term and what is the best course of action when you have a small baby. If there’s no feeding problems, then there’s a good chance the tongue tie isn’t severe.

I have a tongue tie myself. The point is that many babies might have a tongue tie but only a very small number have a tongue tie which actually causes severe issues.
you can need speech therapy without tongue tie and you can have teeth problems without tongue tie.
Breathing problems are obviously extremely serious but presumably if a child has breathing problems they would need to be treated in hospital. If tongue tie really is a cause of breathing problems it would be surprising because in the past we have never heard of this as a cause of breathing problems yet surely babies being born with tongue tie cannot be a recent thing. Your mention of breathing problems is likely to strike great fear into the heart of any parent who thinks their child might have a tongue tie.

If it isn't causing issues then I wouldn't worry. I have two DC with TT. First was pretty bad and couldn't feed at all on the breast and struggled with bottle also. We decided to correct the tongue tie for these reasons, second wasn't bad at all and breastfeeding was successful thankfully so we left TT alone and it hasn't caused any issues

Blimey! When you read breathing problems you immediately go for hospitalisation?

@Newnamefor2021 are you in the UK? We'd never ever put to sleep for a TT snip in anywhere I've worked and I've worked in alot of max fax hospitals and private clinics

Swansea. He has surgery in December.

I thought it was weird they insisted. He had it cancelled twice due to having no beds, the second tike I asked why they couldn't just do LA and they said they don't and it isn't nice for them at their age. I actually spoke to two surgeons about it.

So yep, Swansea definitely do it under GA.

I have twins who both had a tongue tie. DTD2 wasn't identified till later and wasn't snipped. DTD1 was identified and was snipped as she was struggling to feed/ gain weight/ used to barf up formula.

Now they are older its made no difference to anyone speech. I would say I have an elder child who had a tongue tie snipped but it scarred badly and the tongue tie became fleshy and thick. It had to be corrected under general anasthetic, under NHS, by the consultant who had performed the tongue tie snip originally. She was lovely and very pro bf. I do wonder if you'd struggle to get help on the NHS if there were complications. GP was very blase.

For me it was Dundee, Scotland, 10 years ago under general when he was 8 months. It's not a new thing. If the consultant doesn't think it can be done cleanly, or if it's too thick and will cause excess bleeding or if it's impossible due to unco-operative child then it's better to do it under general where they can do a good job.

I'm sorry I've not read the whole thread, but both DS and I have tongue ties. Unfortunately by the time they could have snipped it when he was a baby, I'd already given up breastfeeding as it was too awful. Therefore neither of us have had ours snipped, and apart from not being able to stick my tongue out too far, it's not impacted my life in any way.

Hi spoke to both my teens OP .. 13 year old still can’t stick his tongue out but that’s his normal and he had no other concerns . 14 year old he can stick his tongue out and thinks his tie broke naturally a few years ago - he is quite a stoic calm creature and thinks it’s a non issue . My own assessment is there is no rush provided baby is feeding ok

What sort of anaesthesia do you use?

Thank you for asking! Helpful to know their experience!

@Miscellaneousme hey, did your 7 month old have it done under a GA?

from my research online I thought that any baby over 6 months had to have a general for tongue tie release?

My daughter had hers released at 10 months in the UK. Just a quick snip with scissors, no anaesthetic. She wasn’t bothered by the procedure.