Dosage form modification and oral drug delivery in older people

Many people cannot swallow whole tablets and capsules. The cause ranges from difficulties overriding the natural instinct to chew solids/foodstuff before swallowing, to a complex disorder of swallowing function affecting the ability to manage all food and fluid intake. Older people can experience swallowing difficulties because of co-morbidities, age-related physiological changes, and polypharmacy. To make medicines easier to swallow, many people will modify the medication dosage form e.g. split or crush tablets, and open capsules. Some of the challenges associated with administering medicines to older people, and issues with dosage form modification will be reviewed. Novel dosage forms in development are promising and may help overcome some of the issues. However, until these are more readily available, effective interdisciplinary teams, and improving patient health literacy will help reduce the risk of medication misadventures in older people

Nurse experiences of medication administration to people with swallowing difficulties living in aged care facilities: a systematic review of qualitative evidence

To identify nurses' experiences of administering oral medications to residents of aged care facilities (ACFs) with swallowing difficulties.Administering medicines to older people with swallowing difficulties is a challenging task. Nurses frequently modify oral medications e.g. by crushing/splitting tablets or opening capsules, to facilitate the administration process. These practices are associated with an increased risk of medication administration errors. However, the reasons for these practices from the nurse's perspective are not well understood.The review investigated studies on the experiences of nurses of any level with the responsibility of medication administration in ACFs in terms of problems and challenges they encountered when administering oral medicines to aged care residents with swallowing difficulties. Aged care facilities providing all levels of care were considered for inclusion. Qualitative studies including, but not limited to, phenomenology, grounded theory, ethnography and action research designs as well as mixed methods studies and text and opinion papers were considered.A comprehensive database search of PubMed, CINAHL, Embase and Scopus was conducted between October and December 2016. MedNar and ProQuest Dissertations and Theses were used to search for gray literature. No date limitation was applied. The Joanna Briggs Institute Qualitative Assessment and Review Instrument critical appraisal tool (JBI-QARI) was used to assess the quality of the papers. The JBI-QARI data extraction instrument was used to extract qualitative findings. Data synthesis was not applicable in the final analysis due to the inclusion of only one article.The initial search resulted in 1681 unique titles for screening. A total of 202 abstracts were screened, after which a full-text review conducted for 19 articles. After the full-text review, only one article was eligible to be included in the final report. The included study scored highly in terms of methodological quality. The findings highlighted issues around time constraints, complexity of medication administration process to residents of ACFs with swallowing difficulties, cost and resources for alternative strategies, inefficient information flow and communication among healthcare professionals, and nurses' knowledge and training needs.The limited findings of this systematic review indicate that further research is necessary to provide evidence of nurses' experiences with regards to administering oral medications to older people with swallowing difficulties living in ACFs. A comprehensive understanding of these experiences may lead to organizational system changes to support nurses and older people with swallowing difficulties in ACFs

Unlocking opportunities in food design for infants, children, and the elderly: understanding milestones in chewing and swallowing across the lifespan for new innovations

Intake of a variety of foods increases the likelihood of good general health. From as early as life in utero, humans are exposed to flavor. Further flavor imprinting occurs via breast milk, increasing the likelihood of acceptance of a variety flavors when solids are introduced. While first foods need to be smooth and runny, experience managing soft lumps is required for rudimentary development of chewing skills. Texture experiences are critical to providing building blocks for food acceptance and gradual increase in the range of food textures eaten. Persistence in offering flavors and textures on multiple occasions increases the likelihood of acceptance of new foods. Opportunities exist in novel food texture use and flavor bridging to improve food variety in children. During adulthood lifestyle changes impact on chewing and gastrointestinal efficiency affecting the variety of food consumed. Foods that are moist, and encourage the consumer to slow down and savor food may reduce diseases affecting the esophagus. The aging process sees an increase in medication use with an impact on reduction in saliva flow. Further, physiologic changes in taste and olfaction that occur with aging may see elders benefit from novel food design that utilizes the intact trigeminal system. New food design opportunities exist in the areas of carbonation, dissolvable solids, microencapsulation of flavor volatiles or pressurized carbon dioxide granules. The use of standardized nomenclature for food labeling, description, and measurement methods such as that used by the International Dysphagia Diet Standardisation Initiative is advocated to accelerate food oral processing research.The human feeding, chewing, and swallowing mechanism adapts and changes over the life span. There are opportunities to influence flavor development from as early as life in utero, and through milk feeds. Infants also need exposure to soft lumps to develop rudimentary chewing skills that lay the foundation for mature chewing. Melt-in-the-mouth textures and familiar flavors can help children to bridge to new food and diminish development of picky eating. Similar textures can also be used for the elderly particularly if used with food flavors and compounds that excite the trigeminal system to promote increased food variety. Adults taking medication with dry mouth side effects benefit from moist foods. Special populations, such as those with swallowing difficulties, may benefit from use of micro encapsulated compounds that trigger the trigeminal pathway. Introduction of a food texture labeling system is advocated

Age-related changes to eating and swallowing impact frailty: aspiration, choking risk, modified food texture and autonomy of choice

Reductions in muscle mass and strength are well known complications of advancing age. All muscles of the body are affected, including those critical to chewing and swallowing. A diagnosis of frailty and its features of weakness and unintentional weight loss are particularly relevant to the aging swallowing system. Age related changes to eating and swallowing function means that there is a natural tendency for elders to self-select 'soft' foods due to loss of dentition and fatigue on chewing. However, it is not well known that tooth loss and poor dental status is associated with increased choking risk, especially as people age. In fact, people over 65 years of age have seven times higher risk for choking on food than children aged 1-4 years of age. Texture modified foods are provided clinically to reduce choking risk and manage dysphagia. Although certain food textures offer greater swallowing safety, they significantly restrict food choice. This commentary paper will highlight age-related changes to the eating and swallowing system, noting especially those that are relevant for frail elders. Swallowing impairments also affect the ability to manage liquids, and aspiration risk in healthy and frail elders is also discussed. Modified food textures that are most often recommended by clinicians to maintain sufficient oral intake and reduce choking risk will be described, while also highlighting the nutritional challenges associated with these foods and offering some solutions. The ethical challenges associated with balancing the autonomy of choice of food textures with swallowing safety will be addressed

Evaluating chewing function: Expanding the dysphagia field using food oral processing and the IDDSI framework

The dysphagia field is still in relative infancy with a sophisticated knowledge base amassed since the early 1980's. The desire to identify aspiration and prevent life threatening pneumonia has resulted in a focus on the complexities of swallowing liquids. However, humans also ingest saliva, food, and oral medications, with the potential for these substances to incompletely clear the pharynx, be aspirated or block the airway. Safe swallowing of solid food in particular requires adequate chewing function, good oral control, and sufficient higher cortical function. Although screening and assessment for liquid swallowing safety is well established, the same cannot be said for the evaluation of safety to chew and swallow different food textures. While research into liquid swallowing physiology and its clinical application has largely come from the medical and allied health fields, our knowledge of chewing function for food textures comes from food texture research and food sensory science arenas. There is an exciting opportunity to bring the medical and food texture science fields together to expand our knowledge base on human chewing function, with clinical application to people with dysphagia. The development of the IDDSI Framework as an international standardized way of describing and labelling food texture and drink thickness allows the field to move toward management of texture modified food and thick liquids in a coordinated fashion, speaking the same language. This commentary will describe what we know of chewing function and how it is assessed clinically, proposing methods of assessment that utilize the IDDSI Framework

Physiological factors related to aspiration risk: A systematic review

Penetration-aspiration is considered the most serious component of oropharyngeal dysphagia. Clinicians regularly evaluate the pathophysiology of swallowing and postulate reasons or mechanisms behind penetration-aspiration. In this article we share the results of a two-stage literature review designed to elucidate the association between abnormalities in physiological measures of swallowing function and the occurrence of penetration-aspiration. In the first stage, a broad scoping review was undertaken using search terms for nine different structures involved in oropharyngeal swallowing. In the second stage, based on the results of the initial search, a more focused systematic review was undertaken which explored the association between aspiration and abnormalities in respiratory, tongue, hyoid, and laryngeal function in swallowing. A total of 37 articles underwent detailed quality review and data extraction in the systematic review. The results support measurement of tongue strength, anatomically normalized measures of hyoid movement, bolus dwell time in the pharynx while the larynx remains open, respiratory rate, and respiratory swallow phasing as parameters relevant to aspiration risk