Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology This is an RSS file. You can use it to subscribe to this data in your favourite RSS reader or to display this data on your own website or blog.

Long-Term Average Spectral (LTAS) Measures of Dysarthria and Their Relationship to Perceived Severity.
This study investigated the relationship between measures of Long-Term Average Spectrum (LTAS) for speakers with Parkinson's disease (PD) and Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and scaled estimates of perceived speech severity. Perceived severity was operationally defined as listeners' overall impression of voice, resonance, articulatory precision, and prosody without regard to intelligibility. Healthy control talkers were also studied. Speakers were audio recorded while reading Harvard Sentences and the Grandfather Passage. Using TF32 (Milenkovic, 2005), the LTAS was computed for sentences. Coefficients of the first four moments wer...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 11, 2018 Category: Speech-Language Pathology Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Effects of Speaking Rate on Word Recognition in Parkinson's Disease and Normal Aging.
Authors: Forrest K, Nygaard L, Pisoni DB, Siemers E Abstract Current theories of basal ganglia function emphasize their role in the integration of sensory information into motor activities, particularly in the control of movement timing. People with basal ganglia disorders such as Parkinson's disease exhibit poor temporal control of movements, in general and articulation in particular, as demonstrated by irregular speaking rate, reduced stress contrasts, and reduced movement durations and velocities. Previous research has implicated sensory deficits as contributory factors in limb movement control in patie...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

The effects of delayed and frequency shifted feedback on speakers with Parkinson's Disease.
Authors: Brendel B, Lowit A, Howell P Abstract Delayed auditory feedback (DAF) has been assessed as a rate reduction and intelligibility enhancing tool in patients with Parkinson's Disease (PD) for some time. However, there are contradictory results in the literature regarding the success of this device. Also, little is known about the effects of DAF on speech other than influences on speech rate and intelligibility. Frequency shifted feedback (FSF) is known to produce more natural sounding speech than DAF and to improve the fluency of persons who stutter. However, there are currently no studies reporting ...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Algorithmic Estimation of Pauses in Extended Speech Samples of Dysarthric and Typical Speech.
Authors: Green JR, Beukelman DR, Ball LJ Abstract The aim of this study was to evaluate the validity and performance of an algorithm designed to automatically extract pauses and speech timing information from connected speech samples. Speech samples were obtained from 10 people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and 10 control speakers. Pauses were identified manually and algorithmically from digitally recorded recitations of a speech passage that was developed to improve the precision of pause boundary detection.The manual and algorithmic methods did not yield significantly different results. A step...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Speech-Breathing Treatment and LSVT for a Patient With Hypokinetic-Spastic Dysarthria After TBI.
Authors: Solomon NP, Makashay MJ, Kessler LS, Sullivan KW Abstract Previously, we reported improved speech breathing and intelligibility after behavioral treatment for a man with hypokinetic-spastic dysarthria following traumatic brain injury (TBI) (Solomon, McKee, & Garcia-Barry, 2001). Treatment included the Lee Silverman Voice Treatment(®) (LSVT) program followed by 6 weeks of speech-breathing training, physical therapy, and LSVT-type tasks. In this article, we report a new patient with similar speech characteristics post-TBI. Breathing-for-Speech Treatment (BST), custom designed to improve nonspee...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Utilization of Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology Services in Stroke Patients.
Authors: Fridriksson J, Frank E, Vesselinov R Abstract The purpose of this study was to investigate biographical and medical factors associated with utilization of speech-language pathology and audiology services provided to stroke patients in the hospital setting. Moreover, the study sought to identify possible sub-groups of stroke patients that might be under served by speech-language pathologists and audiologists. Discharge data for over 91,000 stroke patients from the years 1996 to 2000 were examined. Using a relatively new statistical approach - a novel decision tree - the analyses revealed an associa...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Diagnostic Assessment of Childhood Apraxia of Speech Using Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) Methods.
We report findings from two feasibility studies using automatic speech recognition (ASR) methods in childhood speech sound disorders. The studies evaluated and implemented the automation of two recently proposed diagnostic markers for suspected Apraxia of Speech (AOS) termed the Lexical Stress Ratio (LSR) and the Coefficient of Variation Ratio (CVR). The LSR is a weighted composite of amplitude area, frequency area , and duration in the stressed compared to the unstressed vowel as obtained from a speaker's productions of eight trochaic word forms. Composite weightings for the three stress parameters were determined from a ...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

An investigation into the influences of age, pathology and cognition on speech production.
This study aimed to provide information on the speech rate behaviour in the three participant groups, comprising speakers with Parkinson's Disease (PD), healthy age matched control speakers (CON), and an older non-dysarthric group with mild cognitive decline (DEM).The analysis revealed that the CON and PD group performed similarly for articulation rate whereas the DEM speakers spoke significantly more slowly. This relationship was reversed for pausing behaviour, where the DEM and CON groups performed similarly whilst the PD speakers produced a higher degree of pause time. All groups could change their articulation rate sig...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Special Panel Session: Driving Critical Initiatives in Motor Speech.
This report contains an introductory statement followed by the panel members' own summaries of the opinions and ideas expressed in their talks. We then summarize the major topics that were considered during the discussion session. This summary reflects the biases and opinions of the participants, and is meant to serve as a thought-piece for the readership of JMSLP, rather than as a scientific report. PMID: 19421339 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher] (Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology)
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Hemisphere-Specific Effects of Subthalamic Nucleus Deep Brain Stimulation on Speaking Rate and Articulatory Accuracy of Syllable Repetitions in Parkinson's Disease.
This study tested the hypothesis that left versus right deep brain stimulation (DBS) of the subthalamic nucleus (STN) would have differential effects on speech. Twenty right-handed individuals with advanced Parkinson's disease (PD) underwent unilateral STN DBS. Ten were operated on the right and 10 on the left hemisphere as indicated by severity of nonspeech motor function. Speech was evaluated before surgery and 3 to 6 months after surgery with stimulator-off and with stimulator-on, with all participants off anti-parkinsonian medication for 12 hours before evaluation. Evaluators and patient speakers were blinded to the st...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

The use of a dual-task paradigm for assessing speech intelligibility in clients with parkinson disease.
THE USE OF A DUAL-TASK PARADIGM FOR ASSESSING SPEECH INTELLIGIBILITY IN CLIENTS WITH PARKINSON DISEASE. J Med Speech Lang Pathol. 2008 Sep 1;16(3):141-155 Authors: Bunton K, Keintz CK Abstract Differences in the clinical and ecological manifestations of reduced intelligibility for individuals with dysarthria related to Parkinson disease (PD) have been reported in the literature. The current study explored whether a dual-task paradigm could be used during intelligibility testing to collect speech samples that were representative of functional performance. Intelligibility was calcul...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Levels of Speech Usage: A Self-Report Scale for Describing How People Use Speech.
This article presents data from the initial analysis of this scale in a sample of 200 people with spasmodic dysphonia (SD). Speech usage was significantly associated with age, education level, and work status (full time, part time, no paid work). Speech usage was not significantly associated with gender, SD duration, self-rating of voice, treatment status, presence of other medical conditions, Voice Handicap Index, or a measure of communicative participation. Further research is needed to explore the function of this scale in other populations. PMID: 21743788 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher] (Source: Journal of ...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Assessment of Orofacial Strength in Patients with Dysarthria.
This study addressed the validity of clinical assessments of orofacial weakness by comparing clinical (subjective) ratings to instrumental (objective) measures. Forty-four adults referred to a speech pathology clinic for dysarthria evaluation were tested for strength of the tongue during elevation, lateralization, and protrusion, and for the strength of the muscles of the lower face during buccodental and interlabial compression. Subjective assessment of weakness involved rating maximum resistance against a firmly held tongue depressor, using a 5-point scale. Objective assessment involved the Iowa Oral Performance Instrume...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

The Feasibility of Establishing Agreement Between Laboratories for Measures of Oropharyngeal Structural Movements.
This report describes the process that was followed toward the goal of establishing measurement agreement. Under the direction of the laboratory directors, one research technician from each laboratory participated in a process that included initial meetings, training sessions, and pre- and post-training evaluation of reproducibility.Because agreement on initial measures of structural movement demonstrated weak correlation on some measures, the research technicians trained together for approximately 6 hours. After training, statistical analyses indicated that (a) most Pearson correlations for measures of structural movement...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research

Temporal and spatial variability in speakers with Parkinson's Disease and Friedreich's Ataxia.
Authors: Anderson A, Lowit A, Howell P Abstract Speech variability in groups of speakers with Parkinson's disease (PD) and with Friedreich's ataxia was compared with healthy controls. Speakers repeated the same phrase 20 times at one of two rates (fast or habitual). A non-linear analysis of variability was performed which used some of the principles behind the spatio-temporal index (STI). The STI usually employs variation in lip displacement over repetitions of the same utterance and a linear analysis of such signals is conducted to represent the combined variation in spatial and temporal control. When wor...
Source: Journal of Medical Speech - Language Pathology - February 13, 2016 Category: Speech Therapy Tags: J Med Speech Lang Pathol Source Type: research