I have been fortunate since entering into private practice in 2018, to forge a relationship with Swallowing Diagnostics, Inc., a Mobile provider of modified barium swallow swallowing studies (MBS). This collaboration allows me to view any modified barium swallow study...
A patient of mine — I’ll call him Frank — fell in his driveway last spring. Within a week he had a physical therapy referral in hand, a fall-risk assessment scheduled, and a home exercise plan taped to his refrigerator. It took another eighteen months, and a...
I’ve sat in a lot of support group rooms and seminar halls over the years. Somewhere around the second or third speaker, it happens — someone at the podium looks out at a room full of people with Parkinson’s disease who drove themselves there, who...
He was adamant. “I don’t have a swallowing problem.” This from a patient who had just coughed his way through half a cup of water, gasping for breath between spasms. It wasn’t until we sat down together and reviewed his video fluoroscopic swallowing study...
“I’m too busy.” “I’m too tired.” “I have too much company.” “I have too many doctor’s appointments.” These are just a few of the “too’s” I hear from my PD patients when I ask: “Did you practice your speech this week?” Some of these excuses sound familiar — they’re the...
