Effects of the head lift exercise on the pharyngeal pressure of chronic stroke patients with dysphagia

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There have been few reports made of swallowing training helping to improve the dysphagia of chronic stroke patients. It has been reported that the implementation of head lift exercises in chronic stroke patients with dysphagia has reduced aspiration, but the detailed mechanism of this has not been made clear. Therefore we implemented head lift exercise in regard to chronic stroke patients with dysphagia with the purpose of studying the mechanism by which swallowing function is improved by head lift exercise, and compared the results of videofluorography and manometric examination before and after exercise. The results showed a statistically significant rise in pharyngeal pressure after the implementation of exercise, as compared to before it, but no changes were noted during the evaluation of videofluorography image analysis. It is possible that head lift exercise among chronic stroke patients with dysphagia may increase pharyngeal pressure and improve swallowing function.