Every now and again a baby comes along whose feeding just doesn’t quite add up. They have no co-morbidities, no coughing or spluttering, no obvious reason to struggle with feeding, yet they struggle all the same. Trayer and team did a retrospective audit looking at these little outliers that keep us up at night. What I’m about to share will either reassure you or make you break out in a cold sweat.

Over ten years, among over 7000 referrals to a hospital SLP department, they found 17 babies who fit the profile of a diagnosis of ‘isolated dysphagia.’ These babies had no risk factors for aspirating, but they were aspirating. The average age at referral was five and a half months old, yet by the time they were diagnosed with dysphagia (and aspiration) via VFSS they were 17 months old; a whole year later…