we went to the swallow study today to see if Hannah was ready to eat…and she is not quite there.
a swallow study is a live x-ray of 2 things. first the techs insert barium (white liquid) into her stomach thru her g-tube to see a) how much her stomach can hold and b) how fast her stomach empties. we did see that her stomach can hold about 100 mL and she empties quickly too…that’s a good thing.
the next test is another live x-ray of Hannah drinking or eating(modified barium swallow). A video X-ray shows the mouth, throat and swallowing tube (esophagus) as you swallow a variety of liquids and food mixed with a metallic liquid called barium.
-
The swallow study is performed in the medical imaging department with a speech-language pathologist and a radiologist. Special equipment is used to provide a "moving x-ray" of Hannah’s swallow.
-
During the test, the Hannah was placed in a chair next to the x-ray equipment. I fed Hannah the food mixed with barium. The barium makes the food visible during the x-ray.
-
The speech pathologist closely watches the x-ray to see how the food and drink move through the mouth and into the esophagus during swallowing and watches for any signs of aspiration (when the food or liquid goes "down the wrong way" into the airway
the thicker the liquid or food…the more likely it will go into the esophagus and not the airway…
Hannah had her first bite to eat today…pureed prunes!!!! (why prunes? to help her digest and pass the barium…its working…3 explosions and counting! yuck!) anyway, she did great working the food to the back of her mouth, the first couple of swallows were great, then we saw a tiny bit of food drop into her airway…that completed the test and it was determined that Hannah is not quite ready to take anything by mouth quite yet.
she did not dislike the prunes in her mouth…no gaging or spitting it out, that is a good sign. hopefully we can continue to give her small tastes of things to keep her interest going.
so, we wait.
No comments:
Post a Comment