On this episode, Theresa sits down with Dr. Diane Longnecker, Assistant Professor at Baylor University and clinical researcher at Baylor Scott and White, and Jamie Anderson, medical SLP and clinical instructor at the University of South Florida, to talk about something a lot of clinicians have heard of but aren’t quite sure what to do with: pharyngeal manometry. Jamie starts with a confession most of us can probably relate to — she rolled her eyes at it when she first heard about it. Now she can’t imagine practicing without it. Dr. Longnecker walks us through why she started using it clinically back in 2019, what her very first case taught her about the limits of visual interpretation, and why she no longer sends a patient for UES management without it. They break down what pharyngeal manometry actually tells you that your modified barium swallow study and FEES simply can’t, which patients belong in the referral pool, what the barriers to starting a program actually look like (reimbursement, analysis time, catheter placement), and why someone in this field needs to take ownership of the UES. If you’ve been curious about this tool but didn’t know where to start, this conversation is a genuinely helpful place to begin.
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Important Links:
https://health.usf.edu/medicine/internalmedicine/swallowing/annualswallowingsymposium-new/overview
Jaimie Anderson is a medical speech-language pathologist (SLP), board certified by the Academy of Neurogenic Communication Disorders (BC-ANCDS). She currently evaluates and treats complex multiphase swallowing, voice, upper airway, and motor speech disorders at one of the nation’s first swallowing centers, the University of South Florida Joy McCann Culverhouse Center for Swallowing Disorders in Tampa, Florida. She founded and hosts an annual international multidisciplinary swallowing symposium that has reached over 1000 attendees virtually and in-person. Her clinical and scholarly interests include implementation science, the assessment of upper esophageal sphincter dysfunction using high-resolution pharyngeal manometry, differential diagnosis and management of motor speech disorders, and functional neurologic disorders impacting speech and swallowing.
Diane Longnecker is an Assistant Professor at Baylor University in Waco, TX. She received her MS in Communication Sciences and Disorders from The University of Texas at Dallas and her PhD in Health Studies from Texas Woman’s University. Dr. Longnecker’s research focuses primarily on swallowing and swallowing disorders in adults. She is also a certified speech-language pathologist and has worked with adults with dysphagia in a variety of medical settings since 2008.
