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Long-term swallow outcomes and factors affecting swallowing dysfunction and quality of life among oral cancer patients: a prospective observational study

  • Head and Neck
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European Archives of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

A Letter to the Editor to this article was published on 18 August 2023

Abstract

Background

Oral cancer is one of the most common cancers among the Indian population. India bears the most burden of oral cancer globally. Impairment of swallowing function is often seen after treatment for oral cancer. The oral phase of swallowing is disrupted in patients undergoing resection for oral cancer. The primary purpose of this study was to evaluate the long-term swallowing outcomes of oral cancer patients using a patient-reported outcome questionnaire.

Methodology

All consecutive oral cancer patients in the cT2–T4 category undergoing curative-intent surgery and reconstruction at our institute from March 2020 to March 2022 were included in the study. The Sydney Swallow questionnaire (SSQ) and functional oral intake scale (FOIS) assessed swallowing outcomes six months after definitive treatment. WHO BREF quality-of-life questionnaire was used to assess health-related quality of life.

Results

A total of seventy patients with oral cancer were included. The median age was 49 years. The majority of them were males (90%). Tumors with cT4 constituted 62%; the rest, 48%, were cT2 and cT3 categories. The bulk of them were buccoalveolar tumors (64.3%. Almost two-thirds of the patients received multimodal treatment. Trismus and xerostomia were at 46% and 88%, respectively. The mean SSQ score was 257.4 ± 99.1. Swallowing outcomes are affected by T stage (p = 0.01), extent of resection (p = 0.01), multimodality treatment (p < 0.01), trismus (p = 0.05), and xerostomia (p = 0.01). Almost 69% of them required special food preparation for swallowing (FOIS 4&5). Patients with buccoalveolar disease (p = 0.05) had significantly poor quality of life.

Conclusion

An advanced stage with extensive resection and receiving multimodal treatment has adverse swallowing outcomes. Post-treatment trismus and xerostomia also significantly affected swallowing results.

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Data availability

The authors confirm that the data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article and its supplementary materials. However, raw data is available with the corresponding author and can be made available with a reasonable request.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of ENT, Prathima Relief Medical College, Warangal, India

    Abhinav Thaduri

  2. Head and Neck Services, Prathima Cancer Institute, Warangal, India

    Abhinav Thaduri

  3. Department of ENT, Kamineni Academy of Medical Sciences and Research Centre, Hyderabad, India

    Sravani Reddy Kappari

  4. Division of Head and Neck Surgery, Kasturba Medical College, Manipal, India

    Kinjal Shankar Majumdar

  5. Department of ENT, Mediciti Institute of Medical Sciences, Hyderabad, India

    Achyuth Panuganti

  6. Remedy Comprehensive Cancer Centre, Lucknow, India

    Shahab Ali Usmani

  7. Department of ENT&Head and Neck Surgery, AIIMS, Rishikesh, India

    Vikramjit Singh, Areej Moideen & Manu Malhotra

  8. Department of Surgical Oncology, Shri Guru Ram Rai Institute of Medical and Health Science, Dehradun, India

    Pankaj Kumar Garg

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Thaduri, A., Kappari, S.R., Majumdar, K.S. et al. Long-term swallow outcomes and factors affecting swallowing dysfunction and quality of life among oral cancer patients: a prospective observational study. Eur Arch Otorhinolaryngol 280, 5091–5100 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00405-023-08155-x

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