Is it dangerous to cut the tendons under the tongue?

Nowadays, some people have shorter tongues and often speak unclearly or vaguely. The reason for a short tongue is generally because there are tendons under the tongue, which makes it difficult to move the tongue. The presence of tendons under the tongue is generally a congenital disease, which is caused by congenital developmental malformation. To improve this condition, many people undergo surgery to remove the tendons under their tongue. So, is it dangerous to cut the tendons under the tongue?

What exactly is tongue tie? Is slurred speech caused by tongue tie ?

Tongue tie, commonly known as tongue frenulum, is a thin strip of tissue between the tongue and the floor of the mouth when a child opens his mouth and lifts up his tongue. A short frenulum, commonly known as a "big tongue", is a congenital developmental abnormality. The main manifestation is that the frenulum in the middle of the bottom of the tongue is too short, which restricts the normal movement of the tongue. The tongue cannot extend out of the mouth or touch the upper lip. When the tongue is extended forward, the tip of the tongue becomes concave due to the traction of the tongue muscles, and the tip of the tongue becomes W-shaped. Director Zhang said that a child’s unclear speech is not necessarily caused by a short tongue tie.

Children with a short tongue tie should be able to speak when they reach the age of talking, but except for the unclear pronunciation of rolled tongue sounds, the other sounds are the same as those of normal children. "Some parents, when they see their children speak little or have unclear pronunciation, suspect that their children have a short tongue tie and ask for surgery. This is very wrong." There was once a report that a 4-year-old child could only say "Dad, Mom". After examination, it was found that he had congenital idiocy, which had nothing to do with the length of the tongue tie.

There are many reasons why children cannot pronounce words clearly. "From a medical point of view, there are two main reasons for inaccurate pronunciation."

One is congenital physical defects, such as congenital cleft lip and cleft palate, missing or deformed teeth, and short frenulum of the tongue;

The second is caused by acquired diseases. For example, when a child is young, he may suffer from neurological diseases, which cause uncoordinated movements of the vocal organs; hearing loss, which causes the child to be unable to hear the sounds accurately and imitate correctly; brain development disorders, etc., can all cause inaccurate pronunciation. In addition, when infants and young children are in the babbling stage, the language center and vocal organs of the brain are not yet mature. In addition, children are easily influenced by the surrounding language environment. For example, if their relatives use Mandarin and dialects alternately, it will be difficult for children to accept it, so slight errors in speech are understandable. Most children will gradually complete self-adjustment of their language system after the age of 4 and can communicate with adults seriously and well. Some children will have to wait until they enter school and learn before they can completely correct their behavior. So, if it is not a tongue tie, cutting it will not make the child speak fluently.

If the surgery is not done well, the trouble will be bigger. There are only two situations where tongue tie needs to be cut.

The reason why many parents decide to have their children's frenulum removed early on is mainly because early surgery does not require anesthesia, stitches, and less bleeding, and the child will feel less pain. But the reality is that if stitches are not sutured after surgery, it is easy to cause scar formation on the surgical wound. As a result, many children have to undergo a second surgery as they grow older, and the effect is not good. Moreover, during surgery, young children are often unable to cooperate well with doctors, and any carelessness can easily cause accidental injuries and infections. The opening of the submandibular gland duct is located on both sides of the frenulum of the tongue. If the doctor's skills are not up to standard and his attitude is irresponsible, he may be careless and sew up the opening of the submandibular gland duct, causing local swelling and atrophy of the submandibular gland.

If parents find that their baby's frenulum is relatively short, the tip of the tongue cannot curl up when the baby opens his mouth, and the tongue is not flexible, they should not think that it is abnormal. In fact, the baby's tongue tie is in the development stage, and the baby is mostly in a tense state at this time. The tongue tie may appear "too short", but it is only a temporary physiological phenomenon. As age increases and deciduous teeth erupt, the frenulum of the tongue will gradually move downward to the floor of the mouth, becoming thinner and looser. The tongue's mobility will also become more flexible, and the frenulum will no longer be short.

There are only two situations in which tongue-tie removal is really necessary: ​​"One is that the child's tongue tie is too short, resulting in weak sucking and affecting the child's breastfeeding; the other is that after the child is 3 years old, the tongue tie is too short to make pronunciation." To determine whether the tongue tie is too short, see whether the child's tongue can extend beyond the edge of the red lips when it is stretched out. If it exceeds this, it cannot be called a tongue tie.