Hello All,

As mentioned in a previous post, I saw my ENT today and asked regarding unsuturing my restructured tongue. His opinion was that (1) I'm still healing and he doesn't want to do anything orally with me for the time being -- I had floor of mouth and pharynx involvement as well as Stage 4 tongue SCC so that accounts for his reluctance I'm sure; (2) most (80-90%) of my tongue was removed and replaced with skin, vessels, and tendons from my forearm to form what he called a "neotongue". He said it looks like a tongue but isn't a tongue in the functional sense since the original muscles that control movement of the tongue are gone. Meaning that even if it were freed up from floor of mouth, it would not funtion like a normal tongue where a person has control over its movements. What little wiggle I have at the back of my tongue is due to the small stump that was left after subtotal glossectomy. So I'm guessing that I would need a heck of a lot more than an outpatient procedure.
He encouraged me to keep trying to swallow as much as possible to build up those muscles plus keep doing the therapy exercises which I will certainly do.
I will continue to pursue options. No one ENT has all the answers.

My best to all,
Jim