Objective: To find the relationship between the clinical manifestations of dysphagia resulting from stroke and dysfunction of swallowing organs. It is helpful to understand the mechanism of dysphagia so as to guide its diagnosis and therapy.
Methods: Oral facial examination experimental swallowing methods were used to identify the abnormal manifestations of dysphagia. Spearman correlation analysis was used as statistic method. Sensitivity (SN), specificity (SP), predictive values (PV+/-) were calculated.
Results: There were about 20 or so abnormal manifestations after stroke and swallowing organs dysfunction include abnormal lip closure, decreased tongue motility, weakness of palate, decreased or disappeared gag reflex, abnormal lift of larynx and insufficient opening of cricopharyngeal muscle. The sensitivity and negative predictive values were high in all the dysfunction organs with the highest sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive value in abnormal lip closure (84.62%), decreased tongue motility (67.75%), insufficient opening of cricopharyngeal muscle (80.96%) and abnormal lip closure (90.91%).
Conclusions: It is comparatively accurate for clinical evaluation to judge dysfunction in lip closure, lingual movement and larynx elevation.