Finding help when it’s hard to swallow
SWALLOWING is like blinking. It’s something people are constantly doing but they hardly ever think about it.
That is until dysphagia, a swallowing disorder, takes hold. Dysphagia specialist company Flavour Creations’ managing director Bernadette Eriksen said it was an intense disease that could take hold of anyone at any time.
“It takes about 26 muscles to engage the motion of swallowing,” she said. “But a lot of those muscles can fail to work as part of multiple sclerosis, stroke or dementia.
“Little kids can have it too. My daughter’s friend was nine when she had a stroke. A cousin of mine was only 34 when she had one.”
When dysphagia begins foods and liquids can’t always be consumed in their natural state. That’s why food thickeners are used to help the body swallow the food or drink and reduce the risk of choking.
“There’s a real risk of aspirating food into the lungs, which can cause an infection, or choking,” Ms Eriksen said.
“People can die from an episode like that.
“What we do is slow down the foods and fluids to get the brain to engage those muscles to swallow.
“With each case of dysphagia it’s different. Sometimes people need thicker fluids but not thicker foods.”
Ms Eriksen said speech pathologists played a big part in understanding what people living with dysphagia had to live with.
“In nursing homes particularly you have to work with speech pathologists to get it right,” she said. “People don’t want to have pureed food and thickened fluids.
“They want to have as normal a diet as possible.”
Ms Eriksen said special cups, such as the ones her company designed, also enabled dysphagia sufferers to drink without assistance.
“Imagine the last 15 years of your life being spent having to ask someone to give you every sip of your drink and every bite of your food,” she said.
“For many people, including little kids, using these modified cups is the first time they’ve ever drank out of a cup by themselves.”
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