Pre-Chaining and Food Chaining© are child-specific intervention programs used to treat pediatric patients with dysphagia and selective eating. Pre-Chaining programs are designed primarily for infants with severe dysphagia. The focus of treatment is rehabilitation of the swallow and pro-active care to keep the infant's feeding development on track as much as possible through the critical periods of the first year of life. At each stage of development, the infant nervous system is ready to acquire new motor skills. The medically fragile infant may not have adequate feeding exposure during these periods of development. This lack of experience may result in great difficulty mastering the skills later in life. Pre-Chaining helps the infant with dysphagia acquire skills with very minimal amounts of food and liquid. Volume is increased only as swallow function and oral skills improve. Food Chaining© has been developed as a systematic method for the treatment of children with food selectivity and aversive eating behaviors. Food Chaining is an individualized, multidisciplinary, home-based feeding program designed to expand food repertoire by emphasizing similar features between accepted and targeted food items. This paper will discuss Pre-Chaining and Food Chaining therapy as methods to treat dysphagia and aversive feeding disorders.
Selective eating behaviors in children: An observational validation of parental report measures
