Abstract
In order to investigate the influence of saliva secretion on to the food chewing function of the elderly, we made healthy adult subjects with normal saliva secretion chew bread, as well as fish sausage, which are even chewable for the elderly. We studied the change of physical properties of the food bolus during chewing. Weseparated the subjects into two groups: one group of 12 subjects (NG) having 2-4ml saliva secretion function and one group of 12 subjects (HG) having a large saliva secretion function, over 4ml.
1) The HG group showed significantly shorter mastication time compared to the NGgroup in either of the food test chewing before swallowing.
2) The change of physical properties of food bolus of bread during chewing was the same in both groups.However, different changes occurred in the NG group and the HG group for the adhesiveness of the fish sausage bolus.
3) No significant difference was seen between the NG and HG groups on the physical properties of bolus before swallowing, with both the bread and the fish sausage.
From these results, indicate that there is a difference in the saliva secretion of adult subjects with normal saliva secretion function. There is influence on the times of mastication and the change of physical properties of food bolus of fish sausage before swallowing. However, saliva secretion showed no influence onthe swallowing physical properties of the food bolus. And also according to the difference in the amount of saliva in the edentulous elderly the same change of physical properties of the food bolus was indicated as with the adult subjects. This suggests that further study of the adult subjects will possiblyhelp in clarifying the relationship between the amount of saliva and chewing function of the elderly.
