dyspaghia

Photo Credit: Elizabeth Wells and Olivia Hallam

Three budding speech and language therapists have been raising awareness for Dysphagia, the medical term for difficulty swallowing.

Olivia Hallam, Rosa Holden and Joanne White, all 20 have completed five days on a modified diet: eating pureed and soft foods and drinking only thickened fluids.

Joanne said: “Dyspaghia is something that us speech and language therapy students learn about. It’s the part that saves lives so it’s really important to us.

“I think that doing this campaign has made us more sensitive to the cause.

“We will be helping people with this is in the future and it’s important to be able to emphasise and now we will be able to give advice from our own personal experience.”

As part of their modified diet, the girls ate a variety of pureed foods to match their own dietary requirements.

Rosa said: “We made a whole range of things, I’m a vegetarian so I blended loads of vegetables, Olivia eats meat so she blended meat dishes and Joanne is a pescetarian so she blended fish.”

The girls, who all study Human Communications Speech and Language therapy at De Montfort University, have also been raising money for Dementia UK.

Rosa said: “It’s a cause that is close to our hearts. I think everyone knows a relative or someone who has faced a difficulty that can lead to dyspaghia but so few people know about it so we felt it was something that we should raise awareness for.”

Using a just giving page online, they have raised £1047 so far, beating their original goal of £400 and the number is constantly increasing.

To read more, pick up a copy of The Demon, out November 17 and to donate to Dementia UK, visit justgiving.com/j-white1.