Diagnostic Validity of Clinical Markers in Detecting Physiologic Swallowing Impairment

The goal of this study is to investigate the diagnostic validity of clinical markers used during clinical swallow evaluations (CSE). Knowing how sensitive and specific our clinical markers are in detecting physiologic swallowing impairment and airway invasion events is an essential step to improve the validity of CSEs, inform targeted treatment planning, reduce unwarranted testing and referrals, and result in more cost effective use of the Speech-Language Pathologist’s time and resources.