Assessment of Swallowing Sounds by Digital Cervical Auscultation in Children

Objectives: There is a lack of studies regarding swallowing sounds in children 3 to 11 years of age. This study aimed to assess swallowing sounds by digital cervical auscultation in children of this age group without symptoms of oropharyngeal dysphagia.

Methods: Digital cervical auscultation was performed in 118 subjects by use of a piezoelectric microphone. The children swallowed 5 mL of liquid and yogurt. The components of perceptual acoustic analysis were discrete initial signal (DIS), main signal of swallowing sound (MS), discrete final signal (DFS), and expiratory return (ER). Duration in seconds was the objective parameter of the swallowing sound signal analyzed.

Results: Fifty-six boys and 62 girls were evaluated at a mean (+/- SD) age of 6.9 +/- 2.03 years. A complete DIS-MS-DFS-ER swallowing sequence was found in 60% of the children. There was no significant difference in swallowing sound duration between both food consistencies (p = .189) or between genders either for liquid (p = .327) or yogurt (p = .792). There was no correlation between age and duration of the swallowing sound for liquid or yogurt.

Conclusions: We concluded that digital cervical auscultation was able to provide objective information about the swallowing process that could contribute to methodological standardization in children.