Burning mouth syndrome
Burning-Mouth-Syndrome
Do you suffer from one or several of these symptoms?
- A burning sensation on your tongue or mouth tissue.
- The tongue is burning mainly at the tip and sides.
- Typically the symptoms get worse in the course of the day.
- The tongue can look unusual (geographic tongue or fissured tongue) or red, but sometimes you cannot see anything.
- Other sensations like tingling, itching or a stabbing pain in your mouth.
- A dry mouth
- A reduced or altered taste.
- Sometimes the problems can be so strong that you cannot bear eating.
| The problem
If the description(s) above fit(s) your problem, you might be suffering from Burning-Mouth-Syndrome. About 5% of the population are affected by this, women more frequently, especially after menopause. |
Possible causes of Burning-Mouth-Syndrome
- Frequently an intolerance or allergy to dental material
- An incompatibility of metals in the mouth (galvanic currents)
- Dentures, for different reasons
- An allergy or intolerance to foods
- An infection with fungi, like candida albicans
- A bacterial infection
- Toxins like nicotine or alcohol
- Other illness like diabetes
- Nutritional deficiencies (often a lack of vitamin B12 and/or folic acid)
What can you do?
To find an effective treatment, you first have to find the cause of your problem.
BTS offers a test for fungal and bacterial infections.
All tests are performed by the Oro-Dental Microbiology laboratory Dr. Hauss.
For your download: Burning Mouth Syndrome Information Leaflet
How to order a test?
For the time being please call our service phone on 0844 330 1909, weekdays 10.00 to 13.00
After you have got your results:
After the results of this test you will be able to either exclude fungi or bacteria as the cause
of your suffering or confirm it.
With this knowledge you will be able to find the appropriate treatment.
The laboratory will recommend how to proceed from the result.
If fungi or pathogenic bacteria are found, you will receive therapy recommendations.
If no microbiological reasons can be detected, you will receive advice how to go on from there and
what treatment might be useful.
Who will give you recommendations?
Jacquie Lane (please see page “About BTS”) will translate your results into English, explain them in writing, give therapy recommendations and answer your questions on the phone if needed.
Anne Phipps:
Hi
Would you advise me about whether a symptom I am currently suffering from is related to candida or another condition which you are aware of and can help with. I have extremely sore skin around my eyes – red, feeling scalded and itching.
Thank you
25 January 2012, 9:34 pmAnne Phipps
Ute:
Dear Anne,
26 January 2012, 9:08 amThank you for asking us about your problem. Any skin problems are extremely difficult to diagnose. Usually we can just exclude one cause after the other and see what we are left with. First we usually have to investigate if this itching is due to an infection. If so, this infection has to be treated accordingly. Often GP’s have enough experience to diagnose this, but like all of us they are specialised and one or the other might not be so experienced in skin problems. However, I would first take that route.
If that has been excluded, then usually the eczema like skin problem comes from your inside as a reaction to something.
It could for example be a contact allergy. Please check if you have used any new make-up or cleaner or if you have new glasses. If so, please avoid any of these for a while and see if the problem subsides. If that is not the case, then sometimes it can be an allergy to something you eat. Difficult to find out. So I would leave that last. It might also be a reaction to intestinal fungal overgrowth (for example candida), called candidid. There a simple stool test for fungi (our Test No 1) would tell you if that could be the case. If that is negative, as I said, then you might look for someone who can test for food sensitivity reliably.
I hope this helps a bit. Kind regards, Ute
Ute Allison, ND