I don't know how frequent tongue tie is in non western societies.  When
I was working in non western societies, I never thought about these
things.  I was a typical supportive pediatrician who encouraged
breastfeeding without knowing anything about it and left the "hands on"
work to the nurses who knew tons.  If I hadn't been so important, I
would have spent more time learning from them.

Nevertheless, there is no reason to suspect that it is a less common
problem in these other societies than in North America.  Women in non
western societies do have problems with breastfeeding, including
occasional, though rare, refusal to breastfeed, sore nipples and poor
weight gain.  As usual, the cause of this is poor latch, but poor latch
may be due to tongue tie.

I do not use anaesthesia when I clip the tongue.  It takes only a
second, and much more time than using anaesthesia.

The baby is ready to nurse immediately.  In fact, if there is any
bleeding at all, the bleeding stops when the baby starts nursing.

Jack Newman, MD, FRCPC