Dental Health

Biography

Biography: Analucia Gebler Philippi

Abstract

Aspiration pneumonia should be recognized as a dangerous condition, especially in older patients. Some patients with aspiration pneumonia have clinical signs, but some patients who aspirate have clinically silent aspiration, with no recognizable signs or symptoms. Concomitantly, prosthetic treatment with dentures is often required for the elderly. It is important to understand the relationship between denture wearing and feeding function from the perspective of swallowing, since not wearing dentures may result in an increased risk of dysphagia with aspiration in these individuals ignored. To help elucidating the role of complete denture wearing on the swallowing function, a randomized paired clinical trial using videofluoroscopic examination was performed. Ten healthy edentulous subjects were administered three swallows of 5 mL barium liquid, three swallows of 10 mL barium liquid, three swallows of 5 mL barium pudding, 3 swallows of 10 mL of barium pudding and 3 bites of barium dipped cracker with and without both complete dentures. After video acquisition and randomization, two independent speech pathologists performed 300 video evaluations considering penetration/aspiration scores and 14 MBSImP variables.             The results showed that wearing complete dentures significantly improved the swallowing function, especially considering solid food consumption (barium dipped cracker).