Postural disorders in mouth breathing children: a systematic review.
Patricia Dayrell Neiva, Renata Noce Kirkwood, Polyana Leite Mendes and 3 others
PMID 28709588WHAT IT FOUND
Mouth-breathing children often show forward head posture and spinal curve changes, but the evidence linking these is weak.
All included studies had low methodological quality and used inconsistent measurement tools, so clinicians should not treat this association as established.
Key findings
01The review found low-quality evidence that mouth breathing is associated with postural deviations in children aged 5 to 14 years.
02All ten included studies scored below the threshold for acceptable methodological quality, with major flaws in participant description, measurement reporting, and confounder control.
03There is no standardization in how posture is measured in mouth-breathing children, with studies using varied tools and landmarks that lack reliability checks.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTsWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
All included studies were rated as low methodological quality. There was no standardization in postural assessment tools or body landmarks across studies. None of the studies verified the reliability or accuracy of the postural measures they used. Confounding factors such as age, sex, and body mass were frequently not reported or controlled. The review excluded studies published in languages other than English or Portuguese. The cross-sectional design of most studies cannot prove that mouth breathing causes postural changes.
Declared interests
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not treat mouth breathing as a confirmed cause of specific postural deviations in children. The evidence is weak because all included studies had significant methodological flaws and used inconsistent, unvalidated measurement methods.