Speech therapy performance in tracheostomized patients in the context of COVID-19

Abstract

Purpose To describe the contributions of speech therapy performance in tracheostomized patients in the context of COVID-19. Methods Retrospective descriptive and quantitative analysis research, using medical records to collect clinical and general variables from patients and speech therapy interventions. For statistical analysis, the Pearson or Spearman correlation coefficient was adopted and a significance level of 5% (p< 0.05). Results Twenty-eight medical records of patients were included (57.1% male) and an average age of 52 years and 1 month, who were hospitalized for approximately 53.7 days and progressed to tracheostomy after 22.1 days of orotracheal intubation. There were ten speech therapy sessions per patient, which started on average 38.4 days into hospitalization and were requested in 39.3% of cases for the progression of tracheostomy and oral feeding. The tracheostomy cuff was kept deflated on the third intervention, decannulation was suggested seven days after the start an d the patient was given an oral diet after five interventions. When we analyzed the time speech therapy interventions began, it showed a positive correlation with the length of hospital stay (p<0.0001), but not with the decannulation process and the length of time with the tracheostomy. On the other hand, the number of speech therapy interventions had a positive correlation with the length of time the tracheostomy was in use and the time until the oral diet was released. Conclusion Speech therapy performance contributes to swallowing rehabilitation and the safe return to oral feeding in patients submitted to tracheostomy in the context of COVID-19.