Credentials and Testimonials
Christine Stevens Mills BS, SLP, COM
IAOM Certified Orofacial Myologist, Speech and Language Pathologist
Christine Stevens Mills is an IAOM Certified Orofacial Myologist and Speech Lanuage Pathologist. She has been in private practice for over 38 years. Christine received a speech and hearing pathology degree in 1973 at Bowling Green State University, Ohio. 
Upon completion of this degree she became interested in the emerging field of myofunctional therapy. She began her training at the Institute for Myofunctional Therapy in Coral Gables, Florida, completing 55 hours Post Graduate training followed by 60 hours advanced Clinical Practicum and over 100 hours advanced Certification. She then returned to her home State of Michigan confident and determined to open her own practice treating children and adults with abnormal tongue patterns and associated open mouth rest posture of the lips. Her initial training in Myo-Functional therapy also initiated her treating thumb/finger/digit/tongue sucking patterns.
Christine opened her first office in 1974 to treat children and adults with orofacial myofunctional disorders. Therapeutic treatment included abnormal tongue patterns, open mouth rest posture of the lips, forward rest posture of the tongue, lip incompetence, and chronic thumb/finger/tongue sucking patterns. Her clinic receives patent referrals from Dentists, Orthodontists, Speech Pathologists, Oral Surgeons, and Pediatricians.
While working with clients she continued her education by taking graduate courses at Wayne State University studying Tongue Thrust Therapy, taking continuing education courses on Oral Myo Functional Disorders at the University of Northern Colorado, and Oral Myo Functional Disorders at the University of Northern Colorado. Determined to be the best therapist she could be in this new field she then went through a very long process of testing to become certified through the International Association of Oro Facial Myology and became certified in 1980. Working in a private practice setting was very rewarding however; she felt she needed to learn from the ground breakers in the field. This desire to work with the best motivated her to take 
courses from the experts who wrote the initial text books. She was very privileged to receive post graduate training in Oral Facial Myology from Dick Barrett and later seminars on Myo Functional Disorders "Awareness and Recognition" from Bill Zickefoose. In later years to round out her education with the continued desire to best help her clients she took courses in nutrition, and air-way obstruction. Christine is on the board of directors for the IAOM and is currently an Assistant Professor at the University of Detroit Mercy Dental School Orthodontic Department, teaching a graduate course on orofacial myofunctional disorders, a position she has held since 2000. She has developed and teaches a four day introductory course "Orofacial Myofunctional Disorders – Rest Posture Therapy" and a Two day course "Thumb Sucking – Chronic to Normal." Both courses provide a foundation in awareness, education, and treatment protocol of orofacial myofunctional disorders.
Testimonials
Jackie from Metamora
My son was referred to you because of a lateral tongue thrust and needed correction so that orthodontic work would be effective. He had difficulty chewing certain foods and trouble with clear articulation. I saw dramatic changes in self-awareness of the position of his tongue and the effects caused by improper placement. Progress with the orthodontist was faster than anticipated. The open bite is corrected, eating and drinking no longer presents a problem, and he is more confident eating and talking when around others. I would absolutely, without hesitation recommend this type of program to other patients. Mrs. Mills offers an outstanding service. She is flexible to the needs of my son, always addressing him in a respectable manner. Her kind demeanor made my son want to please her and thus produced very effective results. The therapy was an adjustment at first, but Mrs. Mills gave numerous suggestions that helped Philip incorporate the therapy into his everyday routine. As mentioned previously, he highly respects her as a therapist.
Karen from Shelby Township
I am very pleased that we chose to have our son work with Christine Stevens Mills. She is a pro and really knows her stuff! I have learned so much from her and it really makes a lot of sense. This is not easy stuff though-I mean the exercises are simple enough, but to make this work you have got to be willing to put forth the time and effort. Our son has been learning completely new behaviors when it comes to his tongue/mouth. It takes a lot of time and energy to build up the muscles and to make these behaviors habit. As a parent you have to be the coach and the cheer leader. My son has been doing these exercises for over a year now-on daily basis-several times a day. It is a commitment and it takes a lot of effort
Ian from Riley, Michigan
Ian is my son who is now 11 years old. When he was born he weighed 8lbs., 6 ozs. So he wasn't really that little. Once Ian started to walk and run around, he trimmed down. Acording to the growth and weight charts that were done every year by his pediatrician at his well visits, Ian was following a steady curve of weight but, a little slower growth, still only being in the 25th percentile.
By the time he was nine years old, like most he needed braces. So, we wne to see an orthodontist. Before he could have braces put on, he needed an expander. Not only an expander, but a tongue crib with it. The tongue crib will be attached to the expander and will hang down inside his mouth and is used to hold back a tongue resting and moving against the teeth. The reason for the crib was to keep the tongue back so the orthodontist could do his job. This tongue crib didn't sound very appealing to me.
In july of 2008, Ian had his expander and tongue crib installed. The assistants at the orthodontic office explained that it will take some time getting used to it like any new thing. I understood that. I still couldn't help feeling like this was some kind of cruel punishment, and I wished that there were some other way of going about this.
Ian seemed to deal with it, probably better than I at first, until it came to eating. We cut food into very small bites so that he would have an easier time chewing and swallowing. Even spaghetti cut up gave him problems, where he felt like he was gagging on it. After that, he wouldn't eat spaghetti at all. Eating got easier, because now Ian was choosier on what he would eat. There were foods that he refused to eat, no matter how small we cut it, because he was afraid of it getting caught on the crib and making him gag.
In March of 2009, the orthodontist removed the expander along with the crib. Things looked good and the Dr. wanted to see how things went with just the braces on. March was also the month that Ian has his yearly well visits at his Pediatrician's office. This year revealed a change in Ian's weight chart. He fell off the graph! Ian had lost weight and the only thing that we could determine it from being, was the tongue crib. The Pediatrician said that he probably will gain now that it has been removed.
We kept seeing the orthodontist for Ian's scheduled appointments. In June, 2009, the orthodontist say the gap opening back up between the top and bottom of Ian's mouth. They wanted a tongue crib to be installed again. I cringed and asked if there was some kind of other alternative? I explained Ian had lost so much weight while wearing the tongue crib I did not want to take the chance of him loosing more if the crib went back in. That is when the he referred us to a woman by the name of Christine Mills who des Myofunctional Therapy. We would have to travel about a 40 mile distance, but I said it will be well worth the miles, anything so Ian wouldn't have to wear a tongue crib again.
Myofunctional Therapy is about training the tongue to be where it is suppose to be within the mouth. Never gave it much thougt myself until meeting Christine Mills. We met with Mrs. Mills in June soon after the referral came. Ian, my husband and I, really liked her. She was very warm, compassionate and really could relate to Ian that he felt very comfortable with her.
Mrs. Mills set up a series of ercises and observations for us to get Ian started with on a daily basis. We continued to see Mrs. Mills weekly as she observed and would make adjustments by adding exercises or increasing them. We were all very committed to making this work, because we knew what the alternative would be. The Tongue Crib! As Ian improved, the visits with Mrs. Mills became less frequent as well as the exercises.
We keep seeing the orthodontist for Ian's regular checks and happily the gap between his upper and lower teeth have gotton narrower and narrower, so there is no need for a crib.
It is now January 2011 and we are still presently seeing Mrs. Mills but only every 6-8 weeks now. Ian has made such progress that we are all really proud of him for being so committed. We are so grateful to Mrs. Mills for knowing how to help our son with the tongue thrust issue to avoid having to use that dreadful crib.
Ian's Mom
Janis - Speech Pathologist in Public Schools and in Private Practice
Myofunctional therapy benefits speech pathology as the public school therapy, which focuses on articulation, and phonological awareness uses a corrective placement and discrimination approach. It often lacks the time for motor-lingual muscular weakness improvement. In my treatment of elementary students; several students reached a plateau for stabilization of the placement into a habitual level of usage. The students could produce the target sound in isolation and imitation at the word level but when co-articulated, the student was often, unable to maintain approximation.
Symptomatic characteristics that were evident included but were isolated to:
1. lower tongue placement .interdental , or a more protruding tongue at rest.
2. articulation errors: s/z, sh, ch, j—often labeled a "lisper".
3. appearance of a more flaccid( flatter) tongue
4. wet lips- particularly the bottom
5. frontal carriage at rest position and in co-articulation
6. open bite / poor occlusion ( poor alignment of top to bottom teeth) 7.
history of difficulty / resistance / with eating more (complex textures) chewier foods as apples/peanut butter , steak, celery.
8. noisy eating ( due to chewing with the lips open) which at times, irritated the peers eating next to the student in the cafeteria.
Having attended myo-functional training many years prior, I recalled the lingual muscular exercises that could be done to improve these characteristics. I remembered learning that if there was a "rest posture problem" and or an abnormal tongue pattern," then post orthodontic treatment, the patient often had a return of structural movement due to the abnormal tongue patterns that were untreated.
I also, remembered Christine Stevens (Mills) having sent out informative brochures to educate the public school speech pathologists in years past.
It is my understanding that oral myo-functional therapy includes strengthening of the muscle groups of the tongue, working with the motor and sensory innervations of the tongue, lips, and palate. The daily home exercises which are monitored by the OMT, corrected several of the students and private clients that I referred to Christine. In particular, was an elementary student, when evaluated appeared to have a large (macroglossic) tongue, rolling of the tongue during treatment, and a reported hypersensitive gag reflex. The parent was spending money weekly for private therapy during the summer months to supplement the schools treatment plan. He reached a plateau. I referred the mother to Christine and within a short period of time she had made marked improvement with him to the point where he did not need to return to a direct speech therapy program. The myofunctional therapy regime also helped to improve the hypersensitive gag reflex to the point the young man was able to tolerate models being taken by the orthodontist. Another student also had a larger tongue and after a few years of therapy; was able to produce sh/ ch/ j sounds but could only produce S/Z when naming picture cards or reading a word list. She was unable to use her "corrected placement" when reading sentences, using a word list in self-formulated sentences, or when conversing with the speech pathologist, peers, and parents. I referred her to Christine and with one on one therapy within a year her gains were significant. The work they did together, to strengthen the tongue, which is a muscle, was remarkable!
Speech therapy in the schools has changed and advanced throughout the years providing language therapy and articulation therapy. However, we need to remember some children may need more. They may need a multidisciplinary approach due to multiple existing problems. Diagnosing these underlying problems is key. Then a multidisciplinary approach utilizing the expertise of the speech pathologist and the orofacial myologist to the benefit of the patient/client/student can be implemented.
The speech pathologist and the orofacial myologist may be the team of the future utilizing their multidiciplinary expertise to bridge the gap between muscle movement and articulation. As a team the orofacial myologist will tackle abnormal tongue patterns; working to correct open mouth rest posture of the lips, low forward rest posture of the tongue, improve tonicity of the midline and eliminate lateral splaying of the tongue to provide the foundation in which the speech pathologist takes it to the next level working with fine motor movement.
Signed, Janis
With all feedback and testimonials therapy results may vary.
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