Sole-ground contact and sitting leg position influence suprahyoid and sternocleidomastoid muscle activity during swallowing of liquids.

Clinically, the stable sole-ground contact in the diet is considered as important for achieving safe swallows in the dysphagic patients. However, the effects of varied sole-ground contacts on swallow-related muscles activities remain unclear. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of sole-ground contacts on the muscle activities during swallow for various materials; 26 healthy adult subjects participated in this study.

Acute Stage Longitudinal Change of Quality of Life from Pre- to 3 Months after Surgical Treatment in Head and Neck Cancer Patients.

Purpose: Head and neck cancer (HNC) patients experience various posttreatment side effects that decrease quality of life (QOL). Some previous study reported that QOL of HHC patients were returned baseline (before treatment) after a year post treatment. However, acute stage longitudinal changes of QOL in HNC patients remains unclear.

Accuracy of cervical auscultation in detecting the presence of material in the airway.

Several studies have investigated the accuracy of cervical auscultation (CA). However, both the sensitivities and the specificities of CA in detecting dysphagic conditions varied widely among these studies. These wide variations of the accuracy of CA might be caused by differences of the targeted sounds, such as the expiratory sound (ES) and/or swallowing sound (SS).

Clinical inter-rater reliability of postural control techniques.

Effectiveness of postural control techniques to compensate for oropharyngeal dysphagia have been recommended and used by several clinicians. However, the inter-rater reliability of these techniques is not well understood. The purpose of this study was to clarify the ambiguity of postural control techniques using statistical analyses.