The MD Anderson nurses taught my husband to do mouth and neck exercises at the beginning of Rad Tx (IMRT) - we just finished week 4 (yeah!). He doesn't do them very often I think because he doesn't feel any changes in his muscles yet.

When does the tightness start? Is it during tx or afterwards as things heal?

Should I "make" him do these exercises? He has an app't with a speech therapist today - perhaps she'll discuss this with him.

Not doing the exercises, for the facial muscles and those used in masticataion, will make it difficult to open his mouth fully when this is all over, for his neck it will leave him with a limited range of motion. He needs to get off his butt and do this stuff, because once trismus sets into the muslce groups it is very hard, if not impossible in some patients, to reverse. At the very minimum he should be concentrating on maintaining the ability to open is mouth using a Therabite or wooden tongue blades every day from the begining of treatment to months after it is over. It's tough to survive this cancer and then find out that you can't open you mouth enough to enjoy eating again when it's all over!!

What is Therabite - no one has mentioned this to us! Do we need a prescription or can we buy it at the drugstore?

Use the forum's search function (at the top of this page) to search for Therabite -- make sure you Search in All Open Forums. It's been discussed quite a bit, and you could PM or e-mail the folks who have used it to get their experience.

You can find additional information using the search function on the main OCF pages.

And here's the Therabite website .

Just wanted to add that I am a firm believer in the Therabite device, I still use it (not every day though, I probably should), I went from not even being able to get one finger in my mouth to being able to get 3. My insurance did not cover the cost, but it was well worth it.
Carol