Transcutaneous Electric Nerve Stimulation (TENS) Treatment for Hipossalivation Induced by Radiotherapy

Currently, cancer is a disease of high incidence, already considered a public health problem. Among the most prevalent are head and neck neoplasms, and depending on the location and extent of the lesion, the treatments are surgery, chemotherapy and / or radiotherapy that have a great impact on the quality of life. Radiation therapy is a frequently chosen treatment, and depending on the dose of radiation, causes changes such as hyposalivation. There are techniques for salivary flow stimulation, however, most of the options involve the use of medications, which limits administration to part of the patients. Transcutaneous electric nerve stimulation (TENS) is an alternative that has been used to stimulate salivary flow, however there is a limited number of studies that have tested this technique after radiotherapy. The aim of this study was to verify the effect of TENS in increasing the salivary flow of individuals receiving radiotherapy to treat tumors of the head and neck. The sample will have 80 patients randomly divided into two groups: TENS group and Control group. In both groups, a quality of life questionnaire (UW-QOL) will be applied and a speech-language assessment will be performed. The hypothesis of this research is that TENS is effective in increasing the amount of saliva. Secondary outcomes involve the evaluation of the effect of this technique on the quality of life, mainly in the questions: speech, chewing, saliva and deglutition.