Re: Oral-motor Stimulator???

[Guest guest]

Michele

The thing that his helped has been a $6.00 electric race car toothbrush

purchased at Walmart. You might give that a try first. Just my 2 cents...

Tammy I.

[ ] Oral-motor Stimulator???

Sue,

Thanks for the positive feedback on the Kaufman

Center.

mentioned the oral-motor stimulator and quite

frankly, it scares the hell out of me. Can anyone out

there give me an idea what this is and how it feels?

Does it actually help with low muscle tone in the mouth?

=====

Michele L. Wysocki

__________________________________________________

[Guest guest]

Tammy,

What a great idea! I still wondering what type of

device they are suggesting using at OT and what it

feels like.

--- Tammy Ingram <tammyplus4@...> wrote:

> Michele

>

> The thing that his helped has been a $6.00

> electric race car toothbrush purchased at Walmart.

> You might give that a try first. Just my 2 cents...

>

> Tammy I.

>

[Guest guest]

<< mentioned the oral-motor stimulator and quite

frankly, it scares the hell out of me. Can anyone out

there give me an idea what this is and how it feels?

Does it actually help with low muscle tone in the mouth?>>

Hi, Michele, yeah, I guess that sounds pretty weird now that I think of it.

It's like Tammy says, just a toothbrush or other types of oral contact to

desensitize or stimulate that area. Sometimes they'll use a washcloth on the

inside of the cheeks and tongue or even the outside, sometimes a little

tongue surpressor action and at the Kaufman center I think she also used a

spongy kind of thing. It's done very kindly and as part of the play-like

atmosphere of speech therapy and I'm a true believer that it helps kids with

low tone. My son didn't eat solid food until about 18 mos and then he

continued to have all sorts of sensory problems with weird consistencies,

plus gagging. This is fairly common with low muscle tone kids. Anyway, the

oral-motor stimulation stuff was a lifesaver in that area and I really think

it helps kids like figure out how to use the muscles in their mouth

better, including the palette (excuse spelling) and tongue. I'm sure you've

heard stories about how many muscles it takes to speak (can't remember the #)

but imagine if those muscles never got the proper signals from the brain to

wake them up. I think artificially stimulating them helps get the pathways

going. Now I'm no scientist, therapist or trained professional -- it just

makes sense to me. Keep in touch. Sue

[Guest guest]

One more thought on this -- it helps with drooling, also, which for

was a pretty bad problem up until around age 5.