Establishing Normative Swallowing Data

Dysphagic patients often do not finish meals and obtain adequate nutrition because of fatigue. Speech-language pathologists need normative rates of swallowing data for healthy individuals in order to write goals for dysphagia therapy. Our research looks at how healthy adults, at two stages in life, differ in rate of swallowing with varying food consistencies. Following the USDA daily recommended portion guide, participants were asked to consume a protein, grain, and fruit. By collecting data from healthy participants, speech-language pathologists will have evidence-based research on how many functional swallows’ individuals should be able to perform to obtain adequate nutrition