Children with tongue-tie often go untreated between 6 months and 4 years while clinicians wait for them to cooperate. Since 80% of brain growth happens by age 3, early intervention around 18 months with frenulum release and stretching exercises produces better speech and feeding outcomes.
We treat a lot of kids in no man's land, I call it. 6-month-old to like the 4-year-old age, people are like, "Oh, just wait till they're 5 or 6 and they can cooperate for it." By that time, they have so many of their eating habits, their sleeping habits, their brain development. By the time they're age 3, the brain is 80% the size of an adult brain. By the time they're age 5, it's 90% the size of an adult brain. A lot of that tremendous amount of brain growth happens those first, you know, through preschool years. Their speech habits, obviously, you know, way more than I do, So all those things, like we want to get them as early as possible if there is a restriction. So yeah, if it's an 18-month-old, you realize they only have 3 words, like that's a problem. And they can't like take solids. They're only doing pouches. Like that's a problem. They have a tongue tie, like fix it at 18 months. Don't wait till they're 5. Yeah. Earlier the better, more team members the better. A full release, really good stretches. That's the key.
What I Was Missing in Feeding Therapy: ARFID, Airway, and Myo with Samy Hernandez
