"Open Wide" Can early treatment improve reduced mouth opening
Research type
Research Study
Full title
"Open Wide" The evidence tells us that radiotherapy can reduce mouth opening. Can premptive intervention mitigate that reduction in mouth opening and is it an acceptable and feasible intervention to use within the NHS setting?
IRAS ID
150643
Contact name
Menna Payne
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Cwm Taf University Health Board
Research summary
Tumours in the mouth, back of the throat, base of tongue, salivary glands and the upper and lower jaw may require chemoradiation/radiation therapy to be delivered to the the jaw joints and muscles. This can cause trismus.
Trismus refers to damage and scarring of the jaw joints and muscles which can lead to a reduction in mouth opening. Trismus is defined as mouth opening less than 35mm. Significant trismus is defined as mouth opening below 20mm.
Trismus can lead to poor oral hygiene, exposed bones, dental caries, difficulties in intubation and swallowing difficulties/reduced nutritional status as well as emotional distress regarding the loss of function.
The proposal is to provide pre-emptive skilled therapeutic intervention to those patients who are due to have radiation treatment to tumours whereby treatment is likely to affect the jaw joints and muscles. We will be examining acceptance of and adherence to the treatment regime.
The aim of the work would be to carry out a feasibility study to test the possiblity of a larger body of work to examine the hypothesis that radiotherapy to the jaw joints and muscles causes trismus and that providing pre-emptive trismus exercises mitigates this reduction in mouth opening.
The findings will be analysed and published nationally and the aim of this single centre small non-randomised study would be to assess the feasibility of a larger multi-centre randomised control trial.REC name
Wales REC 3
REC reference
14/WA/1037
Date of REC Opinion
12 Aug 2014
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion