Artificial neural network classification of pharyngeal high-resolution manometry with impedance data

Objectives/Hypothesis: To use classification algorithms to classify swallows as safe, penetration, or aspiration based on measurements obtained from pharyngeal high-resolution manometry (HRM) with impedance. Study Design: Case series evaluating new method of data analysis. Methods: Multilayer perceptron, an artificial neural network (ANN), was evaluated for its ability to classify swallows as safe, penetration, or aspiration. Data were collected from 25 disordered subjects swallowing 5- or 10-mL boluses. Following extraction of relevant parameters, a subset of the data was used to train the models, and the remaining swallows were then independently classified by the ANN. Results: A classification accuracy of 89.4 +/- 2.4% was achieved when including all parameters. Including only manometry-related parameters yielded a classification accuracy of 85.0 +/- 6.0%, whereas including only impedance-related parameters yielded a classification accuracy of 76.0 +/- 4.9%. Receiver operating characteristic analysis yielded areas under the curve of 0.8912 for safe, 0.8187 for aspiration, and 0.8014 for penetration. Conclusions: Classification models show high accuracy in classifying swallows from dysphagic patients as safe or unsafe. HRM-impedance with ANN represents one method that could be used clinically to screen for patients at risk for penetration or aspiration. Laryngoscope, 2013