Prolonged effect of botulinum toxin injection in the treatment of cricopharyngeal dysphagia: Case report and literature review

Cricopharyngeus (CP) muscle spasm can lead to severe dysphagia. Myotomy of the CP muscle was the treatment of choice. Recently, botulinum toxin type A (BtxA) has been used for CP spasm. It usually brings improvement in deglutition but most patients require reinjection in 3-5 months. We report a 35-year-old man who had an arteriovenous malformation hemorrhage in the brain stem resulting in CP spasm and consequently severe dysphagia. He received BtxA injection and deglutition and nutrition remained good one year after treatment. A literature review analyzing 28 patients and our patient showed negative correlations between age and BtxA dose and between age and duration. Efficacy was positively correlated with duration and BtxA dose was positively correlated with pretreatment severity. In conclusion, physicians would use higher doses on patients with more severe cases but use lower doses on older patients. Those who obtained better post-treatment results would enjoy longer effective duration. Thus, the effective duration of the BtxA is multifactorial.