NCT06166680

Tongue Muscular Assessment in Healthy Children

Assessment of Tongue Motor Functions in Healthy Children

• Status: Recruiting
• Phase: —
• Study type: Observational
• Enrollment: 300 (estimated)
• Sponsor: Université Catholique de Louvain · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 4 Years – 17 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

This study aims to obtain normative values for tongue motor functions in healthy children.

Detailed description

Since the tongue is a complex structure consisting of a continuous array of muscle fibers with varying orientation, tongue motor functions (strength, endurance) are likely to differ according to a protrusion (pulling out the tongue), elevation (lifting the tongue to the roof of the mouth) or swallowing movement. There are currently no normative data for the motor functions of the tongue in children. After their parents fulfilled the Pediatric Sleep Questionnaire, each included children will undergo an anthropometric and a tongue motor functions assessment.

Conditions

• Healthy

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Sleep quality assessment	The following item will be assessed in all subjects (n=420): 1\. Sleep, through the Pediatric Sleep Questionnaire.
OTHER	Anthropometry	The following items will be assessed in all subjects (n=420): 2\. Anthropometric data : 2.1 Height; 2.2 Weight; 2.3 Maximal mouth opening; 2.4 Maximal mouth opening with tongue to palate (with the Quick Tongue-Tie assessment tool)
OTHER	Tongue strength assessment	The following items will be assessed in all subjects (n=420): 3\. Tongue pressure (in kPa) exerted against the IOPI (Iowa Oral Performance Instrument) bulb while swallowing. 4\. Tongue peak pressure (i.e., the maximal pressure - Pmax - exerted against the IOPI bulb) during 3 sec. of tongue elevation. 5\. Tongue peak pressure during 3 sec. of tongue protrusion.
OTHER	Tongue endurance assessment	The following items will be assessed in all subjects (n=420): 6\. The tongue endurance (i.e., the time to task failure in maintaining a pressure equal to 50%Pmax against the IOPI bulb) during tongue elevation. 7\. The tongue endurance during tongue protrusion.
OTHER	Orofacial praxis assessment	\- The following item will be assessed in a subset of subjects (n=31): 8. Orofacial praxis through the Motricité Bucco-Linguo-Faciale (MBLF) test.

Timeline

• Start date: 2023-08-01
• Primary completion: 2026-08-01
• Completion: 2026-08-01
• First posted: 2023-12-12
• Last updated: 2025-02-12

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Belgium