The speech pathologist (Barbara) was just in to check his swallow. Raised him up in bed, removed his C-collar and gave him a few ice chips and teaspoons of ice water.
He had a little trouble at first. After the first ice chip he said he had nothing to swallow; his mouth was so dry it just absorbed all the water before he could swallow.
After a couple tries his throat loosened up a little and he seemed to handle drinking fine. Barbara was explaining the whole swallowing process; how your tongue moves fluid to the back of your mouth to initiate the swallow. With all the damage to his mouth and teeth it's hard to initiate the action, but there's nothing wrong with his throat.
So, he now is cleared for a full liquid diet, which I guess includes puddings and purees and stuff, but he and Barbara seem to agree that he should stick to the less grainy fluids.
He now has the C-collar just for comfort so he can remove it when he wants to drink and can actually drink from a cup.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment