The National Kidney Foundationâs tips to improve your heart and kidney health: 1  Get tested. 2  Eat a balanced, kidney and heart healthy diet. 3  Increase physical activity.  Reduce high cholesterol 1  levels. Keep high blood pressure under control.  If you have diabetes, keep your blood sugar well 1  controlled. Quit smoking.
A typical swallow involves several different muscles and nerves. Dysphagia can be caused by a difficulty anywhere in the swallowing process described above. There are two types of dysphagia: A symptom is something the patient feels and reports, while a sign is something other people, such as the doctor detect. For example, pain may be a symptom while a rash may be a sign.
The consequences of dysphagia include dehydration, starvation, aspiration pneumonia and airway obstruction.1,2 Dysphagia may result from or complicate disorders such as stroke, Parkinson's disease and cancer. Indeed, aspiration pneumonia is a common cause of death in hospitalized patients. This article reviews the basic concepts of normal and abnormal swallowing, methods of evaluating dysphagia, and treatment strategies, with emphasis on disorders of oral and pharyngeal swallowing.