Dental management of the patient difficulty in swallowing

Hyun,  Hong-Keun

J Korean Dent Assoc > Volume 53(11); 2015 > Article

The Journal of The Korean Dental Association 2015;53(11):789-794.
Published online November 30, 2015.

섭식연하장애와 치과적 관리

현홍근

서울대학교 치의학대학원 소아치과학교실

Dental management of the patient difficulty in swallowing

Hong-Keun Hyun

Department of Pediatric Dentistry, School of Dentistry, Seoul National University

Abstract

Swallowing disorders or dysphagia, which are difficulties with the act of swallowing, can occur at different phases such as oral, pharyngeal, and esophageal phase in the swallowing process. These disorders can be caused by structural, functional abnormalities or psychological problems. Dentists can actively provide patients suffering from dysphagia with comprehensive professional care, especially from the cognitive stage of food to the pharyngeal stage of the swallow. Many cases of dysphagia can be improved with careful managements based on dental professionals' knowledge, including meticulous evaluation of masticatory and swallowing functions, training on eating and swallowing, and fabrication of palatal or lingual augmentation prosthesis. The important thing is that prevention of these disorders through the oral health care instruction and planned follow-up dental visit at periodic intervals in order to manage the problems caused by anatomical, functional, and psychological reason.

Key Words: Swallowing disorder;Dysphagia;Postural training;Palatal augmentation prosthesis;Lingual augmentation prosthesis;