Laserson Orofacial and Speech

05/06/2024

What a wonderful experience it was to spend 4 days at the International Consortium of Ankylofrenula Professionals (ICAP) conference. Meeting and hearing from professionals from all over the United States, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Australia, Norway, Italy, Ireland, and more.

My mom always teases me that I like bad seats:), and based on these photos I suppose she's right!

A tremendous conference, filling me with a wealth of information, and a healthy dose of humility as I see once again how much more there is to learn.

01/28/2024

This week in ASHA Leader Live, a brief article entitled "Clarifying Social Media Information about Pediatric Feeding Disorders" warrants even more clarifying! In other words, today's blog could have been titled "Clarifying Social Media Information about 'Clarifying Social Media Information about Ped...

01/21/2024

"To ensure adequate nutrition for optimal learning, students need at least 20 minutes at school to eat lunch—not counting time walking to the cafeteria, standing in often-long lines, and choosing and paying for lunch—according to American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations. However............... many students [don't] spend their 20 minutes on focused eating, instead distractedly hurrying through their lunches, overfilling their mouths, or not eating nearly enough."

Kudos to the Feeding and Swallowing Team of Midwestern Intermediate Unit IV in Pennsylvania for creating a puppet show to teach students about safe eating. Such a fun, creative, and effective way to get the message across!

School-based SLPs develop a puppet show to teach young students eating behaviors that prevent accidents and conflicts, and ensure proper nutrition.

12/24/2023

And here it is: ASHA's new Feeding and Swallowing Milestones

ASHA's feeding and swallowing milestones are designed to help you know what to expect as your child grows and develops and to know when to seek the guidance of a speech language pathologist.

12/21/2023

Thank you to Dr. Richard Baxter for his brilliant response to the recent outrageous NYT article about tongue ties. The article was one-sided, oversimplified, and sensationalistic. Worse than that, it was irresponsible and will result in people not getting the help they need.

The decision to perform a lingual frenectomy, like any surgical procedure, should be considered and weighed carefully with the help of professionals with expertise. I wish the NY Times did the same when it made the decision to ignore the real story.

https://tonguetieal.com/the-real-story-of-the-booming-business-of-tongue-tie-nyt-article-response/?fbclid=IwAR2mOj_AN_4y__P4npElQOzPxF8T9vRqzO-dYpVFMvftdxmbv2AbcG5xga0

A recent New York Times (NYT) article accused tongue-tie providers of over-treatment, harming babies, taking advantage of vulnerable moms and babies, and, of course, doing it purely for financial gain. Tongue-tie naysayers jump on the article and share it - “See! I told you so!” and, in so doing...