Prevalencia de disfagia orofaríngea en ancianos institucionalizados y su relación con síndromes geriátricos

Abstract

Background and objectiveoropharyngeal dysphagia is often an underestimated symptom, with clinical significance because of the severe complications it may cause. The main objective of this project is to estimate the prevalence of oropharyngeal dysphagia among institutionalized elderly people and, specifically, to determine its relationship with geriatric syndromes or giants. Patients and methodthe study population was composed of 30 subjects older than 80 years institutionalized in a Nursing Home. All variables analyzed were obtained from a multidisciplinary clinical assessment. The assessment tools used were: the Mini-Nutritional Assessment®, the Barthel Scale, the Geriatric Depression Scale, the Volume-Viscosity Swallow Test and the Short Portable Mental Status Questionnaire. The data were managed with SAS® 9.4 and imported from the original database into Excel using SAS® Enterprise 6.1. Resultsprevalence of oropharyngeal dysphagia in this population is 41.5%. There is a statistically significant relationship between the Barthel Index and the presence of oropharyngeal dysphagia (P=.0279), unlike the cognitive status (P=.8951), nutrition (P=.1470) or the presence of depression (P=.999). Conclusionsoropharyngeal dysphagia is highly prevalent among elderly institutionalized patients. Functional health status may be a risk factor for suffering oropharyngeal dysphagia. The presence of depression does not appear to influence the onset of this symptom. Worse cognitive and nutritional status is significantly related to the incidence of oropharyngeal dysphagia.