Session 5

You made it over the "hump" of the Intensive Phase of treatment... and this week you will focus on food and liquid swallows! Lots to celebrate this week. 

Parents: With therapy, and as you will see in this week with the cracker swallow, use foods that taste good and are uniform in texture for the teaching of the cracker swallow technique.

The idea here is to introduce the cracker swallow as a technique to slow down the steps of the oral phase (chewing and bolus formation) of swallowing. This requires adequate salivation to prepare the bolus, and the bilateral chewing puts pressure on both sides at the same time (which is something we don't really do in real life). I recommend trying this technique with a cracker substance and explaining it slowly, without the rubber band to begin. Then when they are able to do this, add the rubber band.