Current Status and Issues of Dysphagia Care in Hospitals and Long-Term Care Facilities in Gifu Prefecture
- VernacularTitle:岐阜県内の病院・介護施設における摂食嚥下支援体制の現状と課題
- Author:
Norio WATANABE
1
;
Yukie FURUZAWA
2
;
Mariko SOUMIYA
2
;
Rika USAMI
2
;
Mayumi KOZAKI
3
;
Tomoko MIYATA
4
Author Information
- From:Journal of the Japanese Association of Rural Medicine 2022;70(5):485-497
- CountryJapan
- Language:Japanese
- Abstract: A survey was conducted to determine the current status and issues of dysphagia care in hospitals and long-term care facilities in Gifu Prefecture. Responses were obtained from 14 hospitals, 13 welfare facilities for elderly adults requiring long-term care (WFs), and 13 geriatric health services facilities (GHSFs). Dysphagia teams were present at 12 hospitals, 4 WFs, and 8 GHSFs. The teams primarily consisted of general nurses (hospitals = 12, WFs = 4, GHSFs = 8; same order below), certified dysphagia nurses (11, 1, 0), nutritionists (11, 4, 7), speech-languagehearing therapists (11, 0, 5), physicians (7, 2, 4), and pharmacists (7, 0, 0). Facilities that employed certified dysphagia nurses conducted screening for dysphagia, but many hospitals and long-term care facilities did not review patients’ medications to identify medications that could cause dysphagia. In addition, many hospitals did not educate care workers about assisting with eating and swallowing. This demonstrates a need to improve dysphagia-related screening and educational systems for nurses and care workers at hospitals and long-term care facilities.
