Oropharyngeal dysphagia, a clinical condition that indicates difficulty in moving food and liquid from the oral cavity to the esophagus, has a markedly high prevalence in the elderly. The number of elderly people with oropharyngeal dysphagia is expected to increase due to the aging of the world’s population. Understanding the current situation of dysphagia screening is crucial when considering future countermeasures. We report findings from a literature review including citations on current objective dysphagia screening tests: the Water Swallowing Test, Mann Assessment of Swallowing Ability, and the Gugging Swallowing Screen. Pneumonia can be predicted using the results of the screening tests discussed in this review, and the response after the screening tests is important for prevention. In addition, although interdisciplinary team approaches prevent and reduce aspiration, optimal treatment is a challenging. Intervention studies with multiple factors focusing on the elderly are needed.

Cancer is one of the most common causes of death worldwide. Along with the advances in diagnostic technology achieved through industry–academia partnerships, the survival rate of cancer patients has improved dramatically through treatments that include surgery, radiation therapy, and pharmacotherapy. This has increased the population of cancer “survivors” and made cancer survivorship an important part of life for patients. The senses of taste and smell during swallowing and cachexia play important roles in dysphagia associated with nutritional disorders in cancer patients. Cancerous lesions in the brain can cause dysphagia. Taste and smell disorders that contribute to swallowing can worsen or develop because of pharmacotherapy or radiation therapy; metabolic or central nervous system damage due to cachexia, sarcopenia, or inflammation can also cause dysphagia. As the causes of eating disorders in cancer patients are complex and involve multiple factors, cancer patients require a multifaceted and long-term approach by the medical care team.

Whenever you prescribe for an abnormality of one of the reflexes, you should think about the effect of the prescription on the other reflex.

We concluded that LLLT at the wavelength and parameters used in the present study was effective for chronic pain of the elbow, wrist, and fingers.

Facial nerve palsy is one of the most frequent cranial neuropathies among disorders of the 12 cranial nerves. Since this nerve runs along the temporal bone and spreads to the superficial part of the face, the facial nerve can be easily affected by injury or physical pressure, or inflammation. Among those affected patients we have come across, Bell's palsy was frequently noted when the patients had an upper respiratory tract infection, or when they felt fatigue or exposed to stress. In many cases, we could not find the exact causes. The facial nerves control the facial expression muscles, and therefore the face in affected patients becomes asymmetrical. Especially among female patients, they are not satisfied by the conventional treatment from a cosmetic point of view. The present study was designed to investigate the treatment efficacy of Low Level Laser Therapy (LLLT) for Bell's palsy. Subjects and Methods Twenty-three consecutive cases with Bell's palsy were enrolled in the present study who visited either the Department of Otorhinolaryngology, or Department of Neurology our university hospital between April 2002 to March 2006. They underwent 2 weeks of steroid administration before attending the Department of Rehabilitation. All cases were in the subacute or chronic stage. Twelve patients were female, and 11 were male. The age distribution ranged from 21 to 82 years, with an average of 51.7. There were 10 cases with right side facial palsy, and 13 with facial palsy of the left side (Table 1). We used a 1 watt semiconductor laser device (Fig. 1, MDL2001, Matsushita Electric Corporation, Tokyo, Japan), the specifications of which are seen in Table 2. The area over the stellate ganglion was irradiated with the laser for 30 seconds per shot, giving a radiant flux of 20.1 J/cm 2. Three shots 135