Torticollis

We found out at Silas' two month check up that he had Torticollis.  I hadn't even heard of Torticollis until after I had Silas - from a friend that is a physical therapist.  When he was almost two months old I had her take a look at his neck.  She thought there might be some tightness so we asked about it at our 2 month well check.  The doc immediately referred us for a PT eval after seeing Silas. 

Torticollis:
Congenital torticollis is most often due to tightness in the muscle that connects the breastbone and the collarbone to the skull. (It's called the sternocleidomastoid muscle). This is called congenital muscular torticollis. This tightness might have developed because of the way your baby was positioned in the uterus (with the head tilted to one side) or because the muscles were damaged during delivery.
Babies with torticollis may also develop positional plagiocephaly (asymmetrical head shape) because they'll often sleep with their head turned to the side.

Basically Silas would always lean his head to the right and look to the left.  We started PT a two months and just finished (at 6 months).  We loved our PT, Lana.  She did a great job working with Silas and teaching me how to help to. Basically lots of tummy time and stretching.  Silas' is finally doing better and you can't even tell anymore.  His head has rounded out too. :)

You can really see it in these pictures.  We are thankful for good medical care and that we saw results almost immediately after starting PT. 

 

When the PT evaluated Silas she noticed some developmental delays as well.  She felt that Silas wasn't progressing developmentally because of the torticollis and his fussiness.  It was a huge blessing to get him caught up developmentally as we were working on his physical issues too.