Immediate effects of simple palatal augmentation prosthesis in maximum tongue pressure and swallowing functions for acute stroke patients: An observational study.

PURPOSE: Acute stroke often leads to dysphagia. In the oral stage of dysphagia, there is a potential for immediate benefit from using a palatal augmentation prosthesis (PAP). We investigated whether our quickly fabricated, simple, and expedited version of PAP would result in an immediate improvement in swallowing function after an acute stroke.

METHODS

We analyzed the records of stroke patients that were hospitalized between October 2019 and March 2022 and met the following criteria: they had a rehabilitation prescription and had paralysis of facial or hypoglossal nerves and either repeated salivary swallowing test ≤2 times or modified water swallow test ≤3, they were fasting, were within 3 weeks of onset, and had a simple PAP made for them. Outcomes included with/without PAP, maximum tongue pressure, repeated salivary swallowing test, and modified water swallow test on the day after starting to wear PAP was started. In addition, within one week, a videofluoroscopic examination was performed to measure the oral transit time, pharyngeal transit time, and penetration aspiration scale. Statistical analyses were performed using Wilcoxon signed-rank tests. Statistical significance was set at P < 0.05.

RESULTS

Fifteen patients met the inclusion criteria and were included in this study. The mean age of the subjects was 76.9 ± 9.0 years. The use of PAP significantly increased maximum tongue pressure (P < 0.0001*) and shortened oral transit time (P < 0.0091*). There were no significant differences among the other items.

CONCLUSIONS

Simple PAP immediately increased the maximum tongue pressure and improved swallowing function during the oral stage.