Report glossary
You got the report. Now, what do the words mean?
Swallow study reports are written for clinicians, then handed to families. These are the 34 terms that come up most, in plain language, each one linked to the source it came from.
This explains vocabulary, not your results. Knowing what a word means is not the same as knowing what it means for the person you care for. Only the SLP who ran the study can tell you that. Bring this page to the follow-up and ask.
Findings
Premature spillagePremature spillage means food or liquid slipped back from the mouth into the throat before the swallow had actually started.Delayed swallow initiationDelayed swallow initiation means the automatic throat part of the swallow started later than expected after food or liquid reached it.Reduced hyolaryngeal excursionReduced hyolaryngeal excursion means the voice box and the small hyoid bone did not lift and move forward as far as expected during a swallow.Wet vocal qualityA wet or gurgly sounding voice during or after eating and drinking, which clinicians listen for as one possible sign of a swallowing problem.DysphagiaDysphagia is the medical word for a swallowing problem — trouble moving food, drink, or saliva from the mouth to the stomach.Aspiration pneumoniaAspiration pneumonia is a lung infection that can develop after food, drink, saliva, or stomach contents enter the airway instead of the food pipe.Xerostomia (dry mouth)Xerostomia is the medical word for dry mouth — the sensation of not having enough saliva, which can make swallowing dry foods harder.Odynophagia (painful swallowing)Odynophagia means painful swallowing. It is different from dysphagia, which means swallowing is difficult rather than painful.AspirationAspiration means food, liquid, or saliva entered the airway and passed below the vocal folds, heading toward the lungs instead of the food pipe.Penetration (laryngeal penetration)Penetration means food or liquid entered the voice box but stayed above the vocal folds, without passing below them into the windpipe.Silent aspirationSilent aspiration is aspiration that happens without coughing, choking, or any outward sign, so it is usually found only on a swallow study.Pharyngeal residuePharyngeal residue is food or liquid left behind in the throat after a swallow, instead of everything clearing down the food pipe.Sialorrhea (drooling)Sialorrhea is the medical word for saliva escaping the mouth or pooling in the throat, either because more saliva is being made or because swallowing is not clearing it away.Cricopharyngeal dysfunctionCricopharyngeal dysfunction means the muscle at the very bottom of the throat did not relax or open normally to let the swallow pass through.Epiglottic inversionEpiglottic inversion is the flap at the top of the voice box folding down over the airway during the swallow.Nasal regurgitationNasal regurgitation means some food or liquid traveled up toward the back of the nose during a swallow instead of going down the throat.Oral pocketingOral pocketing means food or liquid stayed behind in the mouth — beside the cheek, under the tongue, or along the gums — after the swallow was over.
Tests & scales
Modified Barium Swallow StudyA moving X-ray of your swallow: you eat and drink small amounts mixed with barium so the team can watch the food travel in real time.FEES (Fiberoptic Endoscopic Evaluation of Swallowing)A swallow test that uses a thin, flexible camera passed through the nose to look directly at your throat while you eat and drink.Penetration-Aspiration Scale (PAS)An 8-point rating scale clinicians use to describe how far food or liquid traveled toward the airway during a single swallow, and what happened next.Clinical (bedside) swallow evaluationA hands-on swallow assessment done without imaging, where a speech-language pathologist watches you talk, eat, and drink and examines the mouth and throat.DOSS (Dysphagia Outcome and Severity Scale)The DOSS is a seven-point scale clinicians use to summarize how severe a swallowing problem looked on a swallow study, where 7 is normal and 1 is severe.MBSImP (Modified Barium Swallow Impairment Profile)MBSImP is a standard scoring system an SLP uses to rate 17 separate parts of the swallow seen on a modified barium swallow study.
Anatomy
BolusA bolus is the ball of food or sip of liquid you are swallowing at that moment, after it has been chewed and mixed with saliva.Vallecula (vallecular space)The vallecula is a small pocket at the very back of the tongue, just in front of the epiglottis, where food or liquid can briefly rest.Pyriform sinus (piriform sinus)The pyriform sinuses are two small pear-shaped pockets low in the throat, one on each side of the opening to the voice box.EpiglottisThe epiglottis is a small leaf-shaped flap of cartilage behind the tongue that folds down over the voice box each time you swallow.Upper esophageal sphincter (UES / cricopharyngeus)The upper esophageal sphincter is a ring of muscle at the bottom of the throat that stays closed and opens to let a swallow into the food pipe.
Strategies & exercises
Chin tuck (chin-down posture)A swallowing posture where the chin is lowered toward the neck during the swallow, which changes the shape of the throat.Effortful swallowA swallowing technique in which a person swallows hard, pressing the tongue firmly against the roof of the mouth.Mendelsohn maneuverA swallowing technique in which the voice box is held in its raised position during the swallow to keep the food passage open longer.Supraglottic swallowA swallowing technique that uses a breath hold before and during the swallow to close the vocal folds, followed by a cough.Multiple swallows (dry swallow / clearing swallow)Swallowing again after a bite or sip, with no new food, to help clear anything left behind in the throat.