He is Groot. An Ohio man sprouted green hair on his tongue following an alleged reaction to smoking cigarettes while simultaneously consuming antibiotics. After researchers studied the man’s tongue covered in green fuzz, a study was published in The New England Journal of Medicine.
The unidentified Ohio man is 64 years old, according to the research publication. The man apparently went to the doctor several weeks after his tongue had changed hue and started to develop an emerald-green shade.
At the time, the doctor diagnosed the smoker with a hairy tongue, an abnormal coating of skin cells that forms on the tongue when the filiform papillae, the tiny conical protrusions that contain our taste buds, become abnormally enlarged and discoloured due to a buildup of debris and bacteria in the tongue.
This condition can give these built-up buds a hairy look. These hair-like substances on the tongue can grow as large as an inch when the tongue is not scraped off regularly.
In turn, these enlarged buds can entrap substances like bacteria, food, and yeast, similar to an oral gill net. The American Academy of Oral Medicine wrote on the topic, “Hairy tongue may appear brown, white, green, or pink, depending upon the specific cause and other factors, such as mouthwashes or even candy.”
From the images obtained by the research publication, to a layman, the Ohio man’s tongue looks murky and bright green, like freshly cut garden grass or a second copy of a tennis ball.
The Condition Is Common In Male Patients And Is Caused By Poor Oral Hygiene
This condition generally affects only people over the age of 40. It is more common in the male population and can be caused by poor oral hygiene. Such a condition can be exacerbated by smoking, which causes bacteria and plaque to accumulate on the tongue. In their published research, the doctors did not reveal how long the man had been smoking tobacco to end up in such a condition.
However, the doctors later dug deeper into the case and found out that there could have been another reason behind the man’s condition. The doctors later learned that the man had also just finished taking a regimen of the antibiotic clindamycin for a gum infection.
According to WebMD, taking antibiotics regularly can upset a person’s mouth microbial equilibrium by altering the number and types of bacteria and causing them to amass on the envelope sealer.
