A "user friendly" electromyographic approach to measuring atypical swallowing.

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Through the easymyo’s software and hardware technologies this interesting study was published by Friends and Colleagues Giacomo Begnoni, Maria Cadenas de Llano‐Pérula, Guy Willems, Gaia Pellegrini, Federica Musto and Claudia Dellavia. Congratulations for the interesting contribution to these standardized methods of instrumental analysis that help to better understand the mechanisms of oral physiology but also the single Patient we need to treat.

Background
Swallowing is a complex physiologic function developing mostly in the first years of life. After 6 years old, if mature deglutition is not achieved, swallowing persists as “atypical swallowing” (AS).

Objective
The aim of this study was to detect any electromyographical differences in the muscular activation pattern in patients with and without AS. Materials and methods 38 adolescents and young adults were selected for this study: 20 with atypical swallowing (AS group) and 18 without (C group). Standardised surface electromyographic analysis was performed by the same operator to detect the activity of masseter (MM), temporalis (TA) and submental (SM) muscles. A Student t test for unpaired data was carried out to detect differences between the AS and C groups. A 1‐way ANOVA was performed to detect any differences between the three couples of muscles.

Results
When compared to controls, AS patients showed a significantly longer duration of activity for each couple of muscles and for the whole duration of swallowing act (P < 0.0001) as well as lower intensity of the SM activity (P < 0.05) than controls. Within the AS and C groups, masticatory muscles (MM and TA) showed lower duration of activation (P < 0.01) and lower intensity of the spike (P < 0.0001) than SM. Within the C group, masticatory muscles also reached their activation spike earlier (1‐way ANOVA, P < 0.01) than SM.

Conclusion
Two different muscular performance models have been defined: patients with AS showed a longer activity of all the muscles involved with a lower intensity of SM activity than that of controls.