A look into the booming business of cutting out babies’ tongues

Later in 2020, Ms. Lavelle also filed a complaint with the board, describing how she was traumatized by her daughter’s release.

The lactation board, that reports her disciplinary decisions, took no action against Ms. Henstrom. A spokeswoman for the board, Susan Brayshaw, declined to comment on the complaints, citing a policy of confidentiality. “Some complaints take significantly longer than others due to the nature of the allegations and related investigations,” she said.

The board has been that way since 2002 withdrawn the certifications of only three lactation consultants.

Ms. Lavelle also filed a complaint against Dr. Zinc at the Idaho Board of Dentistry. The board collected medical records and statements from Ms. Lavelle and Dr. Zink. Dr. Zink told the board that the procedure in June was “boring,” but that an extremely small percentage of patients do not respond well to the procedure. He said none of his hundreds of other tongue-tie patients had complained before.

The board’s executive director told Ms. Lavelle via email that the group “did not feel that further investigation was warranted.” It turned out that Dr. Zinc was not to blame.

Late last year, Ms. Henstrom recommended loosening the tongue, lip and cheek ties for a baby named Vivi. A few days later, Vivi’s mother, Aubrey Nobili, sat in Dr. Zink’s waiting room and heard her baby’s screams over the muffled hum of a sound machine.

When Mrs. Henstrom brought Vivi back into the room, the wailing child couldn’t catch her breath. Mrs. Nobili pulled her daughter close and smelled charred meat.

Vivi never breastfed again.

Six months later, a specialist at St. Luke’s assessed Vivi because she had difficulty swallowing and sometimes choked when drinking from a bottle. The specialist subsequently wrote in her medical file that the problems were ‘probably due to’ the laser operation.

Mrs. Nobili is a stay-at-home mom and her husband, Ryan, works at Costco. They have four other young children. They said they racked up more than $5,000 in credit card debt to pay for Vivi’s nutritional therapies.

She turned 1 year old in November. Her family decorated their house with red and pink balloons and dressed her up as a strawberry.

Only one thing was missing: a birthday cake. Vivi still cannot eat solid food.