OESOPHAGEAL CONDITIONS
Dysphagia FAQs
From diagnosis to treatment — see our list of frequently asked questions related to Dysphagia.
About Dysphagia
What is Dysphagia?
Dysphagia is a swallowing disorder that often includes difficulty with chewing, manipulating, and moving food, medications and drinks through the mouth, throat, and oesophagus into the stomach.
What causes Dysphagia?
Dysphagia can occur for a variety of reasons, most often due to a condition that causes weakness in the muscles and nerves used for swallowing. It may also signal a more serious underlying condition, such as GORD or Barrett’s oesophagus.
What are the symptoms?
The primary symptom of dysphagia is the sensation of being unable to swallow or that food is getting stuck in the throat. Additional signs and symptoms associated with dysphagia include; pain, gagging or coughing while swallowing, inability to swallow, drooling, hoarseness, sore throat, regurgitation, frequent heartburn, stomach acid backing up into the throat or losing weight.
Diagnosis and treatment of Dysphagia
How is Dysphagia diagnosed?
Swallowing is a complex process that may be disrupted by any number of different conditions. Because dysphagia has so many potential causes, your doctor may use a variety of different tests. A physical exam combined with further testing, along with discussing your symptoms and history may be required to identify the underlying cause of your swallowing problem.
How is Dysphagia treated?
For dysphagia caused by gastroesophageal reflux disease (GORD) or Barrett’s oesophagus, treatment tends to focus on bringing your GORD symptoms under control while managing your dysphagia symptoms. For example; eliminating alcohol and nicotine, eating frequent smaller meals, following a soft food or liquid diet and cutting foods into smaller pieces.
About Medtronic diagnostic options for Dysphagia
What is an Impedance Planimetry System?
An impedance planimetry system simplifies your path to diagnosis when you are struggling with problems swallowing. Impedance planimetry is a minimally-invasive endoscopic tool that helps identify motility disorders by providing real-time dimension measurements in the oesophagus.
What does an Impedance Planimetry System do?
Impedance planimetry provides additional data that helps physicians better diagnose motility disorders and can be administered during an OGD, allowing both tests to be completed at once. This eliminates excessive testing, reduces the need for repeat visits, and lowers risk by avoiding subsequent sedation.
What is the procedure?
A pressure-sensitive tube with a balloon catheter attached is passed via your mouth into your oesophagus to measure the pressure of the muscle contractions in the oesophagus.
