Bio-signal Feature Analysis to Detect Aspiration Caused by Dysphagia

Dysphagia causes aspiration symptoms and can trigger aspiration pneumonia, poor nutritional status, etc. To address these risks, it is important to properly evaluate dysphagia and link it with treatment and training. However, current dysphagia evaluation methods cannot assess a swallowing function equivalent to that in daily life, owing to the examination method and environment. In this study, we analyzed bio-signal features to realize a system that can detect aspiration symptoms in daily life. Focusing on the neck electrical impedance, swallowing sounds, and a surface electromyogram of the suprahyoid muscles, we created a swallowing-measurement device and analyzed the bio-signals of the throat movement during swallowing. By measuring the swallowing of dysphagic patients, we investigated the characteristic differences, depending on the presence or absence of aspiration symptoms. The analysis results suggest that there were differences in each bio-signal depending on the presence or absence of aspiration symptoms, and these bio-signals could detect aspiration symptoms. This method can detect aspiration symptoms in daily life and evaluate dysphagia more appropriately and simply than current evaluation methods.