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Welcome!
The Hull and East Riding Community Teams consists of 14 valuable staff members all varying in competency and skill. We work closely to meet the Speech and Language Therapy needs of adults within the community.
We work towards supporting people with a range of speech, language and communication problems as well as swallowing problems. Referrals for swallowing problems (known as Dysphagia) continues to increase, and this seems to be most of the work we do today. People with dysphagia often have other health conditions which affects their eating, drinking and swallowing abilities. This ranges from clients who have had a stroke, to those with degenerative conditions such as Dementia and Parkinson’s Disease.
Dysphagia can have potentially life-threatening consequences. They can result in choking, pneumonia, chest infections, dehydration, malnutrition and weight loss. This can have a real impact on the clients’ quality of life as well as those around them.
Giving Voice created a campaign to raise awareness of how dysphagia affects people’s lives, and how Speech and Language Therapy transforms the quality of life of those living with the condition. We can then provide a higher quality of care with our learned understanding of how our recommendations will affect the lives of our clients. We use this insight alongside our theoretical knowledge to ensure clients have the most suitable recommendations that is the least restrictive practice.
Last year’s Swallowing Awareness day saw each member of the team pulling a level of thickener out of the hat, and followed these recommendations for a full day. As we are nearing Swallowing Awareness Day 2019 (13 March), we have been working hard towards developing ideas for raising awareness of dysphagia.
This year, we are taking it one step further and have joined up with the Dietetic service to pull out a diet modification to adhere to for one day. This varies from a ‘level 6 – soft and bite sized’ diet, through to a liquidised diet for the day.
We have also set up a Great British Blend Off challenge, where members of the team will create puree diet masterpieces with a number of VIP’s judging the desserts.
Throughout the course of the week, we are raising awareness of swallowing difficulties in a community hospital setting as well as a nursing home with a stroke unit. We carry out lots of work within these settings, and therefore raising awareness but encourage the staff to improve their insight into swallowing difficulties.

#swallowaware2019

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IDSSI Level 6 soft and bite sized

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Enjoyed an IDDSI Level 6 'soft and bite sized' pasta salad with feta cheese for lunch today. It took longer to prepare than my usual lunch - but was worth the effort.  Next time I would definitely buy small pasta shapes which fit the criteria for this diet (bite size pieces 1.5cms for adults) rather than using my usual pasta from the cupboard. Made me think about the planning and preparation needed for patients and their carers to ensure meals comply with the guidelines. Am looking forward to hearing the results from the Great British Blend Off which took place at The Beacon this lunchtime!
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Louise M: Yesterday, I had a Level 5 Minced and Moist diet, meaning all of my food required minimal chewing and the pieces had to be 4mm in size. I spent a lot of time thinking of ways to adapt food I already have. My breakfast didn't change much, I had my normal yoghurt and I didn't add as much milk as normal to my Weetabix, to ensure the milk was completely soaked up by the Weetabix. I normally have a sandwich, crisps and an apple for my lunch so this was definitely a no-no. I had had chilli the day before so thought this would be nice with the inside of a jacket potato. I cooked the jacket potato the previous night, however, it just wasn't soft enough so I couldn't eat that. I also had to pick all the onions, tomatoes, kidney beans and peppers out of the chilli as these weren't small enough. I also had a muffin that I mixed with yoghurt and this was a lot nicer than I thought it would be. It didn't look appetising but the taste didn't change at a
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Educating a Nursing Home We kicked off Swallowing Awareness week on Monday with a trip to a local Nursing Home educate staff about dysphagia and the change to IDDSI. Staff have received training through different formats around the change to IDDSI, but we took the opportunity to reinforce the importance of adhering to the recommendations.  We had around 25 staff attending over the course of the afternoon, ranging from therapy staff to chefs and carers.  The first station raised awareness around different red flags to look for when working with patients. Within the nursing home, we typically carry out bedside assessments due to ease of having the patient's in the setting and using what is available. We showed videos of videofluoroscopy assessments which peaked the interest of lots of people and gave them further inside into alternative methods of assessment to support our recommendations.  The second station gave staff the opportunity to have a go at thickening drinks and tryi
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