speech and language therapy

Neonatal hypotonia presents with low muscle tone and an array of symptoms that vary depending on the etiology. The differential diagnosis for this condition is complex. It is crucial to exclude life-threatening causes before following a diagnostic algorithm and performing additional tests. Given the wide range of clinical symptoms and etiologies for neonatal hypotonia, rapid genetic testing has the potential to expedite diagnosis, reduce invasive testing such as muscle biopsy, reduce hospital stays, and guide condition management...

BACKGROUND: Laryngopharyngeal symptoms such as cough, throat clearing, voice change, paradoxic vocal fold movement or laryngospasm are hyper-responsive behaviors resulting from local irritation (e.g., refluxate) and heightened sympathetic tone. Laryngeal recalibration therapy (LRT) guided by a speech-language pathologist (SLP) provides mechanical desensitization and cognitive recalibration to suppress hyper-responsive laryngeal patterns. This study aimed to assess symptom response to LRT among patients with chronic laryngopharyngeal symptoms symptoms undergoing evaluation of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD)...

PURPOSE: Speech fluency has important diagnostic implications for individuals with poststroke aphasia (PSA) as well as primary progressive aphasia (PPA), and quantitative assessment of connected speech has emerged as a widely used approach across both etiologies. The purpose of this review was to provide a clearer picture on the range, nature, and utility of individual quantitative speech/language measures and methods used to assess connected speech fluency in PSA and PPA, and to compare approaches across etiologies...

BACKGROUND: The field of human expert performance teaches us that high quality, high-dose guided practice is required to make large gains in cognitively driven acts. The same also seems to be true for people with acquired brain injury, yet therapy services for people with aphasia (PWA) have traditionally not been designed with this in mind. Intensive Comprehensive Aphasia Programmes (ICAPs) are one way to address the chronic under-dosing of therapy that most PWA experience. AIMS: There are several ways to deliver an ICAP; here we describe two iterations of our Queen Square ICAP...

BACKGROUND: Primary healthcare in South Africa aims to transform the national health system by emphasising community-based care and preventive strategies. However, rehabilitation services, particularly for individuals with disabilities and chronic non-communicable diseases, are often overlooked in primary healthcare. This study aimed to investigate the provision of primary healthcare rehabilitation services in the Johannesburg Metropolitan District by exploring client sociodemographics and variations in services provided by rehabilitation professionals...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: We examined the allocation of visual attention in an association task by both neurotypical participants (n = 11) and adults with fluent aphasia (n = 12). RESEARCH DESIGN: Participants were presented with a picture (e.g., a basket) followed by a semantically related association (i.e., "strawberry") and an orthographically related association (i.e., "b," the first letter of "basket"). ANALYSIS: An eye tracker recorded their eye movements for three areas of interest (AOI): the picture, the semantic associate, and the orthographic associate, over 1396 observations...

PURPOSE: This study investigates how instructors in communication sciences and disorders (CSD) programs teach about cultural and linguistic diversity (CLD) in general-content courses as well as those dedicated to CLD content with the goal of identifying ways of improving training of preservice clinicians to provide culturally responsive service delivery. METHOD: A survey was sent to 4,192 instructors in CSD programs at 295 institutions in the United States and Puerto Rico, of which 565 responded...

A previous study discovered that two speakers with moderate apraxia of speech increased their sequential motion rates after unilateral forced-nostril breathing (UFNB) practiced as an adjunct to speech-language therapy in an AB repeated-measures design. The current study sought to: (1) delineate possible UFNB plus practice effects from practice effects alone in motor speech skills; (2) examine the relationships between UFNB integrity, participant-reported stress levels, and motor speech performance; and (3) sample a participant-led UFNB training schedule to contribute to the literature's growing understanding of UFNB dosage...

BACKGROUND: Low adherence to non-pharmacological interventions can impact treatment effectiveness. Yet, there is limited information on adherence barriers and facilitators to non-pharmacological interventions in Parkinson's disease (PD). OBJECTIVE: 1) To examine the quality of adherence reporting and 2) to identify key determinants of adherence to PD non-pharmacological interventions. METHODS: A rapid evidence assessment was conducted, following PRISMA guidelines, that included controlled studies of exercise, physiotherapy, occupational therapy, speech-language therapy with explicit reporting of 'adherence' OR 'compliance', published in the last 15 years...

PURPOSE: The study purpose was to compare the practice patterns captured by self-reported logbook data and those recorded by a computerized home program application. The current study is part of a larger single-case research design study aimed at investigating the effect of logbook use on home program adherence in people with aphasia poststroke. METHOD: Data from six adults with chronic aphasia with interest in improving their reading were used in this secondary analysis...

BACKGROUND: Children born with a cleft palate with or without a cleft lip (CP/L) are at increased risk for delayed language development and speech sound disorders. Enhanced Milieu Teaching with Phonological Emphasis (EMT+PE) is a recommended naturalistic intervention for toddlers with CP/L. The parents' role in providing naturalistic interventions is critical and they need training based on learning principles to implement these interventions. Telepractice is an appropriate method for training parents and children with various speech-related disorders...

INTRODUCTION: Evidence-based practice (EBP) is an important component of clinical practice in public health. Its implementation involves interpreting scientific studies and then applying this knowledge to clinical decision-making. In Germany, the therapy professions are often trained in non-academic medical schools, and only a small number of therapists are university graduates. AIMS: This study assessed the current status of EBP among physiotherapists, occupational therapists, and speech and language therapists and to determine whether academization influences the implementation of EBP in Germany...

Nasal obturation using a removable medical device is a suitable treatment option for patients with velopharyngeal dysfunction. In the United Kingdom in recent years, the use of nasal obturation has increased because of the successful collaborations among the Speech and Language Therapy, Restorative Dentistry, and Maxillofacial departments. However, fabrication of the devices requires specialist skill and considerable time. A digital process which facilitates the rapid, cost effective production of a light, comfortable, unobtrusive nasal obturator is described...

Pathogenic variants in SLC6A8, the gene which encodes creatine transporter SLC6A8, prevent creatine uptake in the brain and result in a variable degree of intellectual disability, behavioral disorders (e.g., autism spectrum disorder), epilepsy, and severe speech and language delay. There are no treatments to improve neurodevelopmental outcomes for creatine transporter deficiency (CTD). In this spotlight, we summarize recent advances in innovative molecules to treat CTD, with a focus on dodecyl creatine ester, the most promising drug candidate...

OBJECTIVE: This scoping review aims to provide an overview of the literature investigating the efficacy of speech-language pathology (SLP) interventions in the treatment of globus pharyngeus (GP), identify gaps in knowledge, and guide future research. STUDY DESIGN: Scoping review. METHODS: Search terms were selected for five databases (PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, CINAHL, and Google Scholar). Inclusion criteria were broad and focused on any SLP intervention used to treat GP...

Learning vowel transcription skills is crucial to function as a Speech and Language Therapist (SLT). However, vowel transcription is commonly regarded as particularly difficult and therefore often avoided. Despite the importance of accurate transcriptions, little is known about all the factors that influence the process of learning vowel transcription, which usually includes the learning of the Cardinal Vowel (CV) system. There are only a few studies that investigate how CVs are learnt and what factors lead to successful learning...

BACKGROUND: The incidence of stroke in children is low, and pediatric stroke rehabilitation services are less developed than adult ones. Survivors of pediatric stroke have a long poststroke life expectancy and therefore have the potential to experience impairments from their stroke for many years. However, there are relatively few studies characterizing these impairments and what factors facilitate or counteract recovery. OBJECTIVE: This study aims to characterize the main barriers to and facilitators of recovery from pediatric stroke...

PURPOSE: Stuttering is a speech condition that can have a major impact on a person's quality of life. This descriptive study aimed to identify subgroups of people who stutter (PWS) based on stuttering burden and to investigate differences between these subgroups on psychosocial aspects of life. METHOD: The study included 618 adult participants who stutter. They completed a detailed survey examining stuttering symptomatology, impact of stuttering on anxiety, education and employment, experience of stuttering, and levels of depression, anxiety, and stress...

BACKGROUND: Participation in life situations has been identified by people with aphasia (PWA) as an ultimate outcome of rehabilitation and is often measured with patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) or informant-reported measures. It is known that PWA and informants do not always produce similar scores on measures of activities and participation. However, systematic differences between PWA and informants and the causes of these differences are not well understood. Here, we investigated these differences as a function of language impairment, perceived level of activity and participation success, and depressive symptoms...

PURPOSE: Adults with aphasia gesture more than adults without aphasia. However, less is known about the role of gesture in different discourse contexts for individuals with different types of aphasia. In this study, we asked whether patterns of speech and gesture production of individuals with aphasia vary by aphasia and discourse type and also differ from the speech and gestures produced by adults without aphasia. METHOD: We compared the amount, diversity, and complexity of speech and gesture production in adults with anomic or Broca's aphasia and adults with no aphasia ( n = 20/group) in their first- versus third-person narratives...