Has anyone here ever had salivary gland blockage?

[dfwtexas]

Strange thing happened to me today. Eating a sandwich at lunch, when I was almost done, I noticed pain as I was chewing. When I went into bathroom, noticed my neck, face and jaw were swollen big time! I went to doctor and she said I have a blockage in my salivary gland. She said sometimes, it is due to stone, but she didn't see or feel a stone. She put me on antibotic, said put heat on it and eat sour pickles or candy to try to re-open it! It is very painful. I have never heard of this before.
Anyone on here?

[RobinN]

Due to stone? I have never heard of that either.

[Zoe]

I've had a problem with chronic irritation and swelling of a major salivary gland since a car accident in 1998. The 'stones' are sometimes made up of mucous that didn't drain because it got too dried up and thus blocked the gland. I think they can be made up of calcium desposits too.

The sour pickles or lemon candy is pretty much the standard treatment, the idea being to stimulate it to secrete saliva until it can clear itself up. I found massage, lots of it to alse help mine. Another thing that helps me is to gargle and even drink some xylitol sugar substitute in water. It stimulates the salivary gland and xylitol gum and toothpaste is used to help those who have chronic dry mouth from Sjogren's syndrome.

I also found that frequent rinsing of my nostrils on the affected side can help it to drain also and clear out some of the congestion that can build up. Search on Google about it, as there may be some foods, like sugar, which may be especially irritating for your gland which you can avoid eating. Other rinses I use as a gargle are small amounts of baking soda in water mixed with some vitamin C powder-small amounts; lavender tea made strong and used as a gargle, same with tumeric and with myrrh gum. Just a plain old gargle with warm salt water has helped me a lot with this too.

[Molly97]

When I was coming off Geodon and was taking Ambien to sleep, I had a problem with a salivary gland being completely dry and extremely painful. When I laid down at night, I had to lay so I put extra pressure on the good side to keep my mouth moister and relatively painfree through the night.

[dfwtexas]

Thanks for the information! It is so painful...just when it starts to feel better, I eat and it swells up more.

[pkstinn]

One evening when we were preparing a meal on the sailboat my Dad suddenly became very quiet. He indicaed he was in ALOT!! of pain. Within a moment's time, his jaw swelled. We rushed him off the boat to the ER. The Doc gave him Sweet Tarts candy...he was very afraid to eat them (PAIN!)...but after the third one the crystals that had formed in his saliva gland began to disolve, and the swelling and pain ended as quickly as it had appeared. The body is a strange/wonderful thing :-) and he hasn't had another episode in 3 years. The crystals form into a cyst and the ascorbic acid melts them. I wish my seizure meds worked as well as those Sweetarts did!

[dfwtexas]

Thanks PK...I am going to try sweet tarts today! It is very painful, I had never heard of this before it happened to me