The Jama Dermatology publication reports about the Indian patient of 50 years old, which three months after the stroke found that his tongue was blackened and covered with hair. According to doctors from the American Academy of Medicine of the oral cavity, this is a normal and fairly common phenomenon – a black hairy tongue, or Lingua Villosa Nigra is observed in about 13 % of the population of the planet. The symptom repulsive, but completely harmless, besides it is easy to eliminate it.
The true reason for the change in the language of the Hindu was not a stroke, but a diet of mashed potatoes, which he was prescribed for the duration of rehabilitation. This is the right measure, however, with such a diet, the oral organs actually find themselves without work, and therefore begin to change – and not for the better. In particular, the tongue is constantly cleaned with normal food, but if this does not happen, the upper part of it begins to accumulate dirt.
In addition to just garbage in the tongue accumulates, because of which threaded papillae on the surface of the tongue begin to lengthen. As a result, they take the shape of hairs, quite long and thick, which was observed in the Indian patient. A considerable amount of food stuck in these “thickets”, which leads to the propagation of bacteria and microbes, whose vital waste stains the tongue in different colors – yellow, brown, green or black.
Fortunately for the patient, everything was decided by simple regular cleaning of the tongue with an ordinary toothbrush and the transition to the usual diet of solid food.
Source — Jama Dermatology