What’s the Tongue Got to Do with It? Tethered Oral Tissues and the Voice
Robyn Merkel-Walsh, MA, CCC-SLP, COM©, Vocologist

The tongue is a primary articulator and a significant component of the vocal tract; yet its potential relationship to vocal function is often overlooked. This course examines the intersection of vocology, speech-language pathology, and orofacial myology, with particular attention to tethered oral tissues (TOTs), tongue posture and mobility, hyoid-laryngeal relationships, muscle tension, resonance, and voice.

Participants will review the Power-Source-Filter model of voice production and relevant lingual, suprahyoid, laryngeal, and fascial anatomy to develop a framework for understanding how changes in tongue position, mobility, and muscle effort may interact with phonation and resonance. The presentation considers emerging research examining ankyloglossia, hyoid position, vocal quality, and muscle tension dysphonia while differentiating established evidence from proposed biomechanical relationships and clinical hypotheses.

Clinical application includes assessment considerations across the MYODomains™ of airway, feeding/swallowing, structure, and speech; recognition of compensatory patterns; and discussion of voice assessment and intervention principles, including vocal hygiene, breathing, resonant voice strategies, and semi-occluded vocal tract exercises. A case involving a professional voice user illustrates the integration of orofacial myofunctional and vocology principles in clinical reasoning and interdisciplinary management.

The course emphasizes appropriate professional roles and interdisciplinary collaboration. Participants will consider signs and symptoms that may warrant referral to laryngology, speech-language pathology, or clinicians with specialized training in voice and orofacial myofunctional disorders.

At the end of this webinar, participants will be able to:

• Define vocology
• State one way in which the tongue can impact the voice
• Communicate how vocology and orofacial myology are connected via tongue tie

Robyn Merkel-Walsh, MA, CCC-SLP, COM®, Vocologist, is a licensed speech-language pathologist and Certified Orofacial Myologist® with more than three decades of clinical experience. She is the owner of Diamond Myo & Vocology and Mouths in Motion Mentoring Services, Board Chair of the Oral Motor Institute,  faculty of the Ridgefield Board of Education and an adjunct professor at Brescia University. Her clinical and scholarly work focuses on orofacial myofunctional disorders, tethered oral tissues, pediatric feeding and swallowing, motor speech, and voice/vocology. She is an author, lecturer, course developer, and consultant who has presented nationally and internationally on the relationships among oral structure, function, speech, feeding, airway, and voice.

1 CE credit available to AAPMD members