What's a Lingual Frenulum and When Does it Need to be Corrected?

When you peer into your mouth, we’ll bet you see many things that are familiar to you. The tongue, tonsils, and uvula all tend to ring a bell with most people. Most of us are also familiar with the epiglottis, whose job it is to prevent the inhalation of food into the windpipe. But, what’s that thing called that attaches our tongue to the bottom of our mouth? Well, dear student, that’s called the lingual frenulum. And, sometimes, it needs to be snipped. Let’s find out why. What Is a Frenulum? Frenula are membranous folds of skin or mucous membranes that support or restrict the movement of a part or organ, and they exist in our brain, mouth, digestive tract, and on external genitalia.   In our mouth we have two frenula, the lingual frenulum, which secures the tongue to the bottom of our mouth, and the labial frenula, which connects the upper lip to the gum tissue just above your two front teeth. In most cases frenula develop normally without the need for any sort of correction later in life. However, occasionally labial frenula can overdevelop causing a gap to appear between a person’s two front teeth, and lingual frenula develop without the necessary length for proper speech, or too close to the tip of the tongue which can interfere with eating and speech. When Surgery is Recommended Generally speaking, most physicians and dentists recommend correcting lingual frenula only when they cause a significant amount of pain, or interfere substantially with one’s quality of life, as when eating, swallowing and speaking are negatively affected. Labial frenula that disrupt the positioning of a person’s front teeth and cause a diastema (a gap) commonly self-correct with the aid of orthodontics, and are only recommended after orthodontic work.Occasionally labial frenulum concerns auto-resolve with the arrival of a child’s permanent teeth.

Fun At Health Fair

This has been a really great spring season thus far! The birds are chirping, the days are getting longer, and things are looking up! It's a time for growth, rejuvenation and rebirth and that's why I was very excited to do the Riverside Baptist Health Fair earlier this month!

One of our great patients asked me if I would volunteer. She explained that each year they have a health fair at her church where different providers come from all around the community and do screenings and provide information to help people with the resources they need. They had never had a dentist before but fair-goers in the past had asked for resources concerning their smiles and she was nice enough to think of asking me to attend.

The patient that asked me to come (Joan) met me at an informational talk I did at the Pinecrest Community Center. She knew that I was not shy to present and could answer questions as needed. I was happy and honored she asked me and said of course I would help out at the fair.

Well... The health fair was great! There were people from all over - many came from the community and many from the church itself. Everyone was very nice and they seemed to appreciate my presence there. They were not shy about asking questions and I even got to look in a couple mouths. 

I love answering questions and meeting new people. I give my cell phone freely and tell people to call me anytime if they have a question or what to "talk teeth". It was a great experience overall and I hope to do many more fairs in the future!

 

Thanks Joan for inviting me to the health fair. It was great!!

 Me at the health fair... We were talking teeth in a BIG way!