Contact person
Mats Stading
Senior forskare
Contact MatsThe Gothenburg Throat is a model of the upper throat, the pharynx, which is a passage for both air, food and fluids. The model is used for studying the flow of different foods with the aim of developing foods which are easy and safe to swallow, and to study different types of misdirected swallowing.
Aim and goal
To implement a lab-model of the human upper throat, the pharynx, where most problems of misdirected swallowing occurs, with the aim of developing foods which are easy and safe to swallow, and to study the effect of different types of swallowing disorders.
Challenge
Swallowing disorders, or dysphagia, is related to age and is a growing problem as the population is ageing. Especially older elderlies have problems, 40% of the ones over 70 years, which leads to malnutrition, pneumonia, muscle loss, falls, hospitalization end even Death.
Solution
The project has developed a pharynx model, The Gothenburg Throat, which can mimic all swallowing disorders of the pharynx and characterize the flow of a bolus in detail using manometry and ultrasonic velocity profiling. This means that a product developer can evaluate their fluid products or boluses of their solid food regarding flow behavior during the most critical phase of the swallowing, the pharyngeal phase where aspiration (food going into the airways) may occur.
Gothenburg Throat
Completed
Coordinator
2014-2021
7.2 MSEK
Malmö University Hospital/ Lund University
Mats Stading Johanna E Andersson
A Device that Models Human Swallowing in the journal Dysphagia