Swallowing Exercises for Nasopharyngeal Cancer After Radiation Therapy

National Taiwan University

Status: Completed

Conditions: Nasopharyngeal Cancer; Dysphagia

Treatments: Other: Mendelsohn swallowing exercise; Other: effortful swallowing exercise

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT01937793

000766KJY (Other Identifier)

201211062RIB

Details and patient eligibility

About

This study is designed to investigate the treatment efficacy of 8 weeks swallowing exercise programs for patients with NPC after radiation therapy. This study also compares two different swallowing exercise: effortful swallow and Mendelsohn's maneuver, to see which one can bring more benefits to patients after a certain period of exercise training. Three assessment tools are selected to evaluate the study result: Mann Assessment of Swallowing Ability (MASA), videofluoroscopic swallowing study (VFSS), and Chinese version Swallowing Quality-of-Life Questionnaire (CSWAL-QOL). The hypothesis of this study is that the effortful swallowing exercise would have better treatment efficacy.

Enrollment: 16 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 20 to 70 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• patients diagnosed with NPC
• completed radiation therapy at least 1 year
• mild to moderate swallowing disorder defined by videofluorography
• able to comply with protocal mandate, willing to perform the exercise programs, and ability to attend the weekly sessions

Exclusion criteria

• feeding tube insitu
• received pharyngeal surgery
• tracheostomy tube insitu
• patients who could not put effort to push posterior tongue base backward and who could not elevate their pharyngeal during swallowing
• severe swallowing disorder or aspirate defined by videofluorography
• other malignances, neurovascular disease, demyelinating disease
• cancer relapse or metastases

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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16 participants in 2 patient groups

effortful swallowing exercise

Active Comparator group

Description:

Subjects in the arm are asked to do the effortful swallowing exercise at home for 8 weeks. The training frequency is to exercise 3-4 days/week, 3 times/day, 10 repetitions per time. Besides the at home exercise, each subject is scheduled to meet the investigator at the hospital at weekly basis to discuss and review his/her exercise practice.

Treatment:

Other: effortful swallowing exercise

Mendelsohn swallowing exercise

Active Comparator group

Description:

Subjects in the arm are asked to do the Mendelsohn swallowing exercise at home for 8 weeks. The training frequency is to exercise 3-4 days/week, 3 times/day, 10 repetitions per time. Besides the at home exercise, each subject is scheduled to meet the investigator at the hospital at weekly basis to discuss and review his/her exercise practice.

Treatment:

Other: Mendelsohn swallowing exercise