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Neurophysiological and Biomechanical Evaluation of the Mechanisms Which Impair Safety of Swallow in Chronic Post-stroke Patients

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Abstract

Oropharyngeal dysphagia (OD) is a common post-stroke complication and is associated with respiratory infections. The aim was to assess the biomechanical impairments in swallow function and the afferent and efferent swallowing pathways impairing swallow safety in chronic post-stroke patients. We studied 30 patients with unilateral stroke and chronic OD (> 3 months from stroke onset) with impaired safety of swallow (Penetration–Aspiration Scale [PAS] ≥ 2). We evaluated the efficacy, safety, and kinematics of the swallow response (residue, PAS, laryngeal vestibule closure time [LVCT]) with videofluoroscopy, sensory evoked potentials to pharyngeal electrical stimulation (pSEP), and pharyngeal motor evoked potentials (pMEP) to transcranial magnetic stimulation of both hemispheres. Mean age of patients was 70.1 ± 10.9 years (7 women). Stroke severity at onset was moderate (NIHSS median 10 [IQ range 3–11.5]), and modified Rankin Scale 2.8 ± 1.3. Mean PAS was 5.1 ± 1.9; prevalence of delayed LVCT was 86.7% and 30% presented aspirations. Pharyngeal hypoesthesia was present in 46.7% of patients and 92.3% showed abnormally asymmetrical pSEPs when comparing the ipsilesional with the contralesional hemisphere. Increased duration of swallow was associated with lower pSEP amplitude (P1-N2) in the contralesional hemisphere (p = 0.033). Patients with right hemispheric strokes showed greater reduction of pSEPs amplitude (N1-P1, p = 0.049). In contrast, pharyngeal resting motor threshold and pMEPs were symmetric in 73.3% patients without the physiologic hemispheric dominance. Mild-to-moderate disabled chronic post-stroke patients with OD presented severe impaired biomechanics of swallow response and high prevalence of aspirations. Initial results from the neurophysiological evaluation demonstrated prevalent impairments with disrupted integration of pharyngeal sensory inputs and reduced cortical excitability of efferent pathways. Patients with right hemispheric strokes showed poorer neurophysiological responses.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Jane Lewis for English editing assistance.

Funding

Financial support received by grant from the Fondo de Investigaciones Sanitarias, Instituto de Salud Carlos III (14/00453); CIBERehd, Instituto de Salud Carlos III; and Programa de Estabilización de Investigadores y de Intensificación de la Actividad Investigadora en el Sistema Nacional de Salud (INT 15/00026).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Gastrointestinal Physiology Laboratory, Department of Surgery, Hospital de Mataró, Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona, Carretera de Cirera s/n, 08304, Mataró, Spain

    Christopher Cabib, Weslania Nascimento, Laia Rofes, Viridiana Arreola, Noemí Tomsen, Lluis Mundet, Pere Clavé & Omar Ortega

  2. Centro de Investigación Biomédica en Red de enfermedades hepáticas y digestivas (CIBERehd), Instituto de Salud Carlos III, Barcelona, Spain

    Laia Rofes, Noemí Tomsen, Lluis Mundet, Pere Clavé & Omar Ortega

  3. Neurology Department, Hospital de Mataró, Universitat Autónoma de Barcelona, Mataró, Spain

    Desiree Muriana & Ernest Palomeras

  4. TEI Western Greece, Patras, Greece

    Emilia Michou

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  1. Christopher Cabib
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Correspondence to Pere Clavé.

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All procedures performed in the study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Supplementary Fig. 1

Prevalence of stroke patients with safety and efficacy impairment of swallow using from 5 to 20 ml volumes of the three viscosities (nectar [274.42 ± 13.14 mPa s], liquid [20.40 ± 0.23 mPa s], and pudding [3931.23 ± 166.15 mPa s]) (PNG 89 kb)

High resolution image (TIF 39 kb)

Supplementary Fig. 2

Topography of pharyngeal motor hotspots in patients with left (panel a, n = 20) and right (panel b, n = 10) stroke. The vertex is situated in the bottom centre of each panel (0/0) and the hemispheres are represented in the sides (L = left, R = right, the stroke side highlighted in pale gray). Brain mapping of hotspots obtained through transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) are represented in a 2 × 2 cms. Graph of x/y coordinates with back circles (contralesional) and white triangles (ipsilesional). The average hotspot for all patients (obtained from calculation of the arithmetic mean of values in both axes) of each hemisphere (contralesional and ipsilesional) is shown in the centre of the “cloud” of individual hotspots with a white circle and black triangle (with vertical and horizontal brackets for standard deviation), respectively (PNG 231 kb)

High resolution image (TIF 77 kb)

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Cabib, C., Nascimento, W., Rofes, L. et al. Neurophysiological and Biomechanical Evaluation of the Mechanisms Which Impair Safety of Swallow in Chronic Post-stroke Patients. Transl. Stroke Res. 11, 16–28 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12975-019-00701-2

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