21 Jul 🥴Have you noticed that your baby is holding their head with a tilt? 🤞Have you been trying different therapies and strategies to correct baby’s head tilt?
Here at My Favourite Physio, our Expert Paediatric Physiotherapists 🤓see many newborns and babies for Newborn Baby Checks where we find that babies have a slight head tilt or a misshapen head as a result of a tight neck muscle, a condition known as Torticollis. Occasionally, we see a baby who is 6 months and older with a significant head tilt because their Torticollis was misdiagnosed as something else.
3 Common Misdiagnosis parents are told about their baby’s Torticollis include:
👁️1. Visual Impairment. Baby’s head tilt is sometimes misdiagnosed as a vision or visual processing disorder. As such, parents are told to patch their baby’s eye 4-8 hours a day to correct baby’s vision problem. Some babies happen to have a squint at the same time, which lead to surgical intervention to correct the eye squint, but no impact on baby’s head tilt.
👶🏻2. Plagiocephaly. Baby’s head tilt is sometimes misdiagnosed as a flattened head shape and as a result baby is prescribed Helmet Therapy. Helmet Therapy is designed to place pressure on the pointy parts of Baby heads, while allowing space for the flattened spot on baby’s head. The customised Helmet must be worn 23 out of 24 hours for it to have an impact. The problem with Helmet Therapy is, it does not treat the tight neck muscle causing baby’s head tilt. Instead, Helmet Therapy limits baby’s ability to turn their head, worsening the impact of Torticollis.
🕰️3. Waiting Game. Sometimes parents are told to wait and watch because Baby will grow out of their head tilt. Unfortunately, over time, baby’s head tilt gets worse impacting their awareness of midline, visual processing, neck and shoulder posture and ultimately their spine development.
So if you notice baby has a head tilt, don’t wait and watch, instead ring My Favourite Physio 📱on (02) 9790 4233 or DM us @myfavouritephysio and book in an appointment with one of our Expert Paediatric Physiotherapists🤓 today!
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