Strengthening speech development through timely delivery of orthodontic care: a narrative review

Globally, orthodontic treatment among children and adolescents has reported a remarkable rise, predominantly due to increased awareness about dental esthetics, improvement in dental functions, and most importantly, the benefits attributed to early intervention. This article is based on a narrative, evidence-informed synthesis of published literature on improving speech development through timely delivery of orthodontic care. A PubMed search was conducted to identify studies on speech development and orthodontic care in children using the keywords ’speech disorders’, “malocclusion”, “orthodontic”, and “children” in the title field. Ultimately, 34 articles were included based on their relevance to the review objectives and analyzed. During childhood, speech development and dental changes occur simultaneously, and early dental interventions become crucial in supporting optimal speech development and vice versa. Acknowledging the magnitude of the problem, the long-term impacts on speech development due to misalignment, and the availability of cost-effective orthodontic interventions, there is an indispensable need to strengthen this domain to bring about an improvement in articulation, resonance, and speech clarity. In conclusion, malocclusion and other dentofacial abnormalities may be associated with alterations in speech production; however, the percentage of speech disorders directly attributable to malocclusion remains uncertain. Moreover, speech development is multifactorial and should not be attributed solely to dental alignment. This essentially requires the timely implementation of combined orthodontic and speech-language pathologists’ services to improve both functional and esthetic outcomes.