April 2014 Moms

Tilted Head

If your baby has torticollis should it be obvious? Our pedi is referring us to therapy for a head tilt in DD. I totally don't see it and neither does DH. We went to physical therapy with our son for what we both agree ended up being a pretty bogus reason (our DS wasn't crawling on his knees at 8 months old...he eventually did and he walks and he's pretty normal).

PT is time consuming and expensive under our insurance, but I'm obviously going to do it if my kid needs it and we are going to go ahead and do an evaluation. Still, though, I'm trying to do a reality check here (that we didn't do last time until we were well into things) and see if this is a real problem or not.

I do also realize, that medical professionals can see things that I'm not going to notice. For instance our daughter was a little jaundiced, and the doctors and nurses all said at the time that she looked orange, but she never looked orange to me. Obviously she was jaundiced though, blood tests don't lie.



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Re: Tilted Head

  • lcr23lcr23 member
    My nephew had it but his was pretty obvious. It could be that they are trying to get it under control before it gets worse / more obvious. Good luck!
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  • My DD has mild torticollis and it is visible. Does your LO turn her head both ways? Tilt her head both ways? During tummy time does she favor swinging her head to one side? Torticollis was explained to me as being a combo of tightness and weakness in the muscles, so maybe it is not always totally apparent.
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  • I'm a SAHM, so I really notice DD2's head tilt. DH, a pedi, doesn't think much of it. He just started doing some OMM on her, at my request. If you can get baby in to see a DO and have them show you what they do for torticolis, you can do it at home.
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  • BRBR member
    Sorry, I don't have any experience with this, but I agree that PT for a baby who's not crawling on his knees at 8 mos. is pretty bogus. My daughter didn't crawl until 9 mos. & even then, she pretty much dragged herself using her arms. She is now a perfectly normal two year old. Was there another issue to cause concern? Is this the same pedi you are going to now?
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  • I didn't notice my DD's torticollis at first. After she was diagnosed with it at two months, I went back through the photos on my phone. I could see that, yes, her head was/is always tilted to the right. Maybe look through your pics and see if you notice it?
  • I just talked with DH about this because I felt like maybe your pedi might be pushing PT a bit much. Not crawling at 8 mos is not a big deal. So anyway, he didn't even want to do anything about DD2's torticolis because 1) she feeds well, 2) she's gaining weight, and 3) she doesn't have a flat spot, and 4) she's only 3 mos old. He's only doing OMM on her to appease me (I think). If it were me, I'd skip the PT.
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  • I didn't notice my DD's torticollis at first. After she was diagnosed with it at two months, I went back through the photos on my phone. I could see that, yes, her head was/is always tilted to the right. Maybe look through your pics and see if you notice it?

    This exactly. I'm guessing they want to nip it now bc it can work its way down into baby's hips and back since they are basically not ever laying totally straight. Personally I wanted to do pt so that we could get it nipped now but my LO has a flat spot from it so that is a lot of the reason. I do think just doing the stretches at home has helped a ton
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  • @baily'sbride I was doing this very thing (re the pictures) yesterday. I think its not a tilt exactly, but she sometimes seems to hold her head straight over her right side. I don't know if that makes sense.

    @br it is the same pedi. I did actually consider dropping her all together after the whole PT over crawling thing, but we ended up not doing that b/c she agreed with me over stopping the PT earlier than the actual PT people. After he started crawling on his knees the PT people wanted me to continue going until he started walking! And it was weekly visits that were really adding up in cost and time off work (and of course the people at work who knew what the PT was for all that it was stupid and a waste of time...b/c it was stupid!!) So I called our Pedi about it and she then agreed with me that it was not at all necessary...and I've never really had another issue about her over treating.

    Anyway, I did start the process of going to see the PT people and we are going to a different place. They do start off with an evaluation, and so I'm hoping they will be less conservative than the other place.

    I guess even the 2nd time around, even after posting this, I still don't feel confident enough to just say - "phooey to you medical professional" just yet. If it was over crawling or walking then I probably would but I know torticollis is something that is NBD if treated with PT early. 

    I'm just hoping that if we go in and she really doesn't need it, then it will come out at the evaluation phase.  



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