Dysphagia Management and Cough Rehab: How Can SLPs Assess and Treat?
Presented by Sarah Baar and James Curtis
Audio Runtime: 51 Minutes; Learning Assessment Time: ___Minutes
Join host Sarah Baar, MA, CCC-SLP, and guest Dr. James Curtis, PhD, CCC-SLP, BCS-S, an expert in voice, cough, and swallowing disorders and director of the Aerodigestive Innovations Research Lab, for a deep dive into the critical role of cough in airway protection. Together, they explore how shifting our perspective from “swallowing” to a broader “airway protective” framework can significantly impact patient outcomes and pneumonia risk. You will learn how to implement clinically feasible, objective cough assessments—using simple tools like peak flow meters—to better categorize impairments and move beyond the “one-size-fits-all” approach of strength training. This conversation offers actionable strategies to help you differentiate between weakness and skill-based deficits, allowing you to tailor your rehabilitation plans for maximum clinical impact.
Learning Outcomes
- Analyze the evidence around the role of cough as a core component of airway protection and its physiological relationship with swallowing disorders
- Apply evidence-based, practical strategies to actionably assess cough effectiveness using instrumental measures such as cough peak flow and auditory-perceptual frameworks
- Solve patient case scenarios involving selecting appropriate cough rehabilitation interventions, such as Expiratory Muscle Strength Training (EMST) or cough skill training (CST), based on the patient’s underlying pathogenesis
This is an audio-only course. Additional materials are available for download within the course. To receive continuing education credit, complete the course and the accompanying quiz.
Meet your instructors
Sarah Baar
Sarah Baar is a speech-language pathologist in Grand Rapids, Michigan. She has had the opportunity to work in many settings across the care continuum, including acute care, acute rehab, home and community, and outpatient therapy, and has been involved in various leadership projects. In 2016, she started the Honeycomb Speech…
James Curtis
Dr. James Curtis is a clinician-scientist, Assistant Professor of Speech-Language Pathology, and director of the Aerodigestive Innovations Research Lab (AIR) in New York City. His mission is to improve the health and quality-of-life of people with voice and swallowing disorders through clinical innovation, multidisciplinary…
Chapters & learning objectives
1. Dysphagia Management and Cough Rehab: How Can SLPs Assess and Treat?
Host Sarah Baar and James Curtis explore how SLPs can move beyond traditional dysphagia management by using clinically feasible cough assessments to differentiate between weakness and skill-based deficits for more targeted airway protection.
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Dysphagia Management and Cough Rehab: How Can SLPs Assess and Treat?
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