Prevalence of feeding difficulty for children with myelomeningocele

Purpose:  to assess the prevalence of feeding difficulty for children with myelomeningocele and the importance of a speech pathologist helping them.

Methods:  forty-nine children with myelomeningocele were assessed - twenty-one of them were male and 28 were female, between months and 3 years old. Feeding assessment was done by a speech pathologist. Focus was placed on intra-oral sensitivity, feeding refusal and nausea and/or discomfort, and food consistency ingested.

Results:  it was observed that 65.3% of the children had tongue hypersensitivity and 57.8% had palate hypersensitivity; 73.5% had nausea and/or discomfort; and 79.6% had feeding refusal. That alterations in the children with myelomeningocele make eating time unpleasant and cause conflicts between the caretaker and the child.

Conclusion:  an intra-oral hypersensitivity and feeding refusal can impair eating time, then a speech pathologist’s early intervention in children with myelomeningocele is fundamental.

KEYWORDS:
Meningomyelocele; Feeding; Speech; Language and Hearing Sciences; Prevalence; Eating Disorders