Effect of decreased tongue pressure on dysphagia and survival rate in elderly people requiring long-term care.

Background/purpose: Tongue pressure plays an important role in swallowing function. The purpose of this study is to investigate whether decreased tongue pressure is associated with dysphagia and the development of pneumonia in the elderly requiring long-term care. Materials and methods: Tongue pressure measurement and swallowing videoendoscopic (VE) examination were performed in 60 hospitalized elderly people (33 males and 27 females, with an average age of 84.3 years) to investigate the relationship with the clinical course. Factors related with dysphagia was analyzed by Fisher's exact test and one-way ANOVA, followed by multivariate logistic regression. The relationship between each variable and survival were analyzed by cox regression. Results: Twenty-one patients had dysphagia by VE examination. Multivariate analysis showed that smaller BMI and reduced tongue pressure were significantly correlated with dysphagia. Smaller number of remaining teeth and dysphagia were significantly related to pneumonia-related death. No patients with tongue pressure of larger than 20 kpa died by pneumonia within one year, while in those with tongue pressure of smaller than 20 kpa, one-year cumulative survival rate by pneumonia was 44.3%. Conclusion: Decreased tongue pressure was significantly associated with dysphagia and may increase the risk of pneumonia-related death in the elderly requiring long-term care.

Giant Lipoma Presents from the Buccal Vestibule.

A lipoma is a benign tumor, where the parenchyma is composed of adipose tissue. Lipomas comprise 0.1%-5% of all benign tumors in the oral cavity. A 43-year-old man, with a known masticatory disorder, visited the Department of Oral Surgery at our hospital because of a facial swelling. The swelling, which had worsened over 15 years, was not painful, but the patient had discomfort while eating and talking. A detailed examination revealed a smooth, elastic, soft, circular, and yellowish pink pedunculated tumor-like lesion, with a diameter of approximately 40 mm, on the right buccal mucosa. An oval-shaped neoplastic lesion with a well-defined border of 40 mm × 20 mm was noted on MRI. Based on these results, the lesion was characterized as being a benign lipoma. The tumor was resected under local anesthesia. The pedunculated tumor was excised with an electric knife, and the wound was sutured. No trismus or paresthesia was noted on the postoperative follow-up.