Quality of life in oropharyngeal dysphagia and swallowing in elderly patients with stroke

Abstract

Oropharyngeal dysphagia is characterized by abnormalities of the transfer of the bolus from the mouth to the stomach. In the adult population, dysphagia is most commonly associated with cerebrovascular accidents (CVA). Several studies have been conducted with the purpose of understanding the characteristics of swallowing in individuals with stroke, either through clinical examinations, as instrumental, showing a high incidence of oropharyngeal dysphagia in post-acute stroke cases, and little research has focused on the study of swallowing in chronic cases. Assessing the quality of life related to swallowing allows analyzing the impact of functional changes in the lives of individuals and it is important to understand how patients cope with feeding difficulties, allowing also monitoring the development of the therapeutic process employed. Objective: to investigate the influence of the degree of swallowing dysfunction on quality of life in elderly patients with swallowing in stroke. Methods: for this study 30 patients will be selected elderly patients with stroke in the chronic phase. All subjects will undergo clinical assessment procedures and instruments, the latter performed using the as endoscopy swallowing. Will be tested foods of different consistencies and from the result found is the severity of the disorder classified on a scale of 0 to 3. Moreover, the application will be made protocol quality of life SWAL-QOL. The results will be tabulated in a database and analyzed statistically relevant, through the application of correlation tests between the functional aspects of swallowing and quality of life scores in swallowing. (AU)