Imbalances or difficulties in the muscles of the face, mouth, tongue, lips, cheeks, or jaw can lead to orofacial myofunctional disorders (OMDs), which may affect both children and adults.

When do children typically receive treatment?
Children can be evaluated for OMDs as early as 3 or 4, especially if there are noticeable challenges with speech, swallowing, breathing, or oral habits such as thumb-sucking.

What about younger children?
Before age 3 or 4, support focuses on early skills that promote healthy oral development. This includes building oral motor coordination for feeding and speech, addressing chewing or swallowing challenges, guiding families on reducing oral habits, encouraging nasal breathing, and supporting early sound development—all through playful, parent-supported sessions.

Some children may show patterns or habits that affect oral development, feeding, or speech. These can include tongue thrust, open-mouth posture, low or forward tongue resting, thumb or finger sucking, extended pacifier use, chewing or swallowing challenges, speech distortions such as lisps, tethered oral tissues like tongue- or lip-tie, teeth grinding, or facial muscle imbalances. Early identification and support can help children develop healthy oral patterns, improve feeding and speech, and promote overall oral and facial growth.

Support focuses on exercises and techniques that help retrain the muscles of the mouth and face. This can include promoting proper oral rest posture, encouraging consistent nasal breathing, correcting swallowing patterns such as tongue thrust, improving chewing and mastication, addressing speech distortions, reducing oral habits like thumb or finger sucking and pacifier use, and supporting tongue and lip mobility. Therapy may also include pre- and post-frenectomy exercises for children who have had tongue- or lip-tie releases.

Early guidance and targeted exercises can help children develop healthy oral patterns, improve feeding and speech, and support overall oral and facial growth