Systematic review of case reports of oropharyngeal dysphagia following the use of antipsychotics

Abstract

ObjectiveThe purpose of this systematic review was to examine the effect of antipsychotic medication on dysphagia based on clinical case reports. Patients and methodsLiterature searches were performed using the electronic databases PubMed and Embase. In PubMed, we used the MeSH terms “antipsychotic agents” OR “tranquilizing agents” combined with “deglutition disorders” OR “deglutition”. In Embase, we used the Emtree terms “neuroleptic agents” combined with “swallowing” OR “dysphagia”. Two reviewers assessed the eligibility of each case independently. ResultsA total of 1043 abstracts were retrieved, of which 36 cases met the inclusion criteria; 14 cases were related to typical antipsychotics and 22 to atypical antipsychotics. Dysphagia occurred together with extrapyramidal symptoms in half of the cases and was the only prominent symptom in the other half. The most common strategy against dysphagia was changing to another antipsychotic (n=13, 36.1%). ConclusionsThe data from this review indicate that antipsychotics can increase the prevalence of dysphagia.