Screening of aspiration pneumonia using the modified Mallampati classification tool in older adults

• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0302384
• Publication Date: 2024-05-10T17:39:07Z
• Authors: Jianping Liu; Hironobu Fukuda; Eiji Kondo; Yuki Sakai; Hironori Sakai; Hiroshi Kurita
• Keywords: Aspiration Pneumonia; Choking; Oropharyngeal Dysphagia; Pharyngeal reflex; Hyoid bone; Cough reflex

Pneumonia is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in older adults. In the aging society, screening methods for predicting aspiration pneumonia are crucial its prevention. Changes oropharyngeal morphology hyoid bone position may increase risk pneumonia. This multicenter study aimed to investigate simple effective method dysphagia Overall, 191 adults (aged 65 years or older) were randomly sampled using random sampling technique. Oropharyngeal was assessed modified Mallampati classification, which reflects size tongue cavity. The measured as distance between menton laryngeal prominence evaluate aging-related changes muscles laryngopharynx. Dysphagia repetitive saliva swallowing test (RSST), measures number movements 30 seconds; dysphasia defined less than 3 seconds. signs based on history choking coughing reflex during eating drinking medical findings revealed that classification significantly correlated with A higher incidence evident lower shows smaller base results this suggest be possible predict occurrence