Evaluation of swallowing disorder due to intubation in people with COVID-19

The aim of this study was to determine whether intubation damages swallowing structures in patients intubated with invasive mechanical ventilation. The study included 10 individuals (X male, Y female) who were diagnosed with COVID-19 and intubated and 15 individuals (X male, Y female) who were diagnosed with COVID-19 and treated without intubation. The mean age of intubated participants was 55.22±22 years, while the mean age of non-intubated participants was 52.11±11 years. All participants were evaluated with the Eating Assessment Tool (EAT-10), The Gugging Swallowing Screen (GUSS) and Swallow Quality of Life Questionnaire (SWAL-QOL). The findings were statistically analyzed. In our study, a significant difference (p=0.001) was obtained between the EAT-10 values of the intubated group and the EAT-10 values of the non-intubated group. Although the difference between the GUSS scale score of the intubated group and the non-intubated group was very small, a statistically significant difference (p=0.027) was found. There was a statistically significant difference between the intubated and non-intubated groups in all sub-dimensions of the SWAL-QOL questionnaire ("Burden" p=0.009, "Food Selection" p=0.009) except for the "Communication" sub-dimension (p=0.326), "Eating Duration" p=0.044, "Eating Desire" p=0.039, "Fear" p=0.002, "Sleep" p=0.008, "Fatigue" p=0.000, "Mental Health" p=0.003, "Social" p=0.027) were significantly different. According to the findings, swallowing disorder is likely to develop in individuals intubated with invasive mechanical ventilation method due to COVID-19.