Diane,

It is unfortunate that your uncle's doctors did not warn him about this problem which is a known side-effect of head and neck radiation. Ideally he should have been doing some sort of jaw-opening/stretching exercises throughout treatment. However, that is water under the bridge -- now he needs to have some help. As a first step, he needs to speak to his doctors and get a referral to either a dental oncologist or a speech therapist (both of these can deal with this problem).

The OCF pages mention a device called TheraBite, which has been shown in some studies to improve trismus more than other stretching exercises. Many insurances, e.g. Medicare, will pay for this device if it's prescribed by a doctor, dentist or therapist. My husband, who was diagnosed and treated at about the same time as your uncle, got a TheraBite and found it easy to use. He used it about 7x a day during treatment and continues to use it, albeit less often, since trismus can (in the words of his ENT) "creep up on you." He has no trismus now but did have some resistance opening his jaw towards the end of treatment, so is not being over-confident.

The therapist can probably help wih his speech issues as well...

Gail