Course Description:

Dysphagia clinicians are often faced with the challenge of working with individuals who have difficulty swallowing medications and are frequently asked to identify strategies to facilitate safe and efficient pill swallowing, often without an understanding of medication formulations or effects.  This course will provide participants with information about how pill swallowing affects normal swallow physiology and the impact on people with dysphagia.   Medication formulations will be reviewed and strategies...

Course Description:

Effective dysphagia management involves consideration of a number of factors that may potentially impact safe and efficient swallowing. Recommendations regarding diet, therapeutic techniques, or non-oral feeding can have implications well beyond the swallow system they are designed to impact. Dysphagia clinicians are faced with large amounts of information from a variety of sources, some of it conflicting, as we struggle to provide our clients with the best advice and...

Course Description:

Can manipulation of sensory information impact swallow function?   It has long been understood that the sensory information from a bolus is critical to safe and timely movement of that bolus and protection of the airway.  This course will discuss the roles of various types of sensory input, including taste and flavor, smell, viscosity, and chemesthesis on swallow function.  The role of visual, auditory, and anticipatory cues in food...

Course Description:

People with dysphagia and their family members and caregivers report significant changes in quality of life associated with their inability to swallow safely and efficiently. Health care workers often focus on the signs and symptoms of the swallowing impairment, and do not consistently address the sociological and psychological burdens that those impairments impose.

This course will describe the quality of life issues reported by individuals with dysphagia and their caregivers. Participants will...