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Speech Therapy For Intermediate Stuttering

By admin on Tuesday, September 30th, 2008 | No Comments

There are different techniques used for the treatment of intermediate Stuttering. Such techniques are a mix of fluency shaping and stuttering modification techniques. Here are some of the commonly used techniques for treating intermediate stuttering.

Flexible Rate

Flexible rate is slowing down the production of a word, especially the first syllable.  This technique is thought to allow more time for language planning and motor execution.  In here, only those syllables on which stuttering is expected are slowed, not the surrounding speech. 

Flexible rate is taught by having the clinician model production of words in which the first syllable and the transition to the second syllable are said in a way that slows all of the sounds equally.  Vowels, fricatives, nasals, sibilants, and glides are lengthened, and plosives and affricates are produced to sound more like fricatives, without stopping the sound or airflow. 

After the clinician’s model, the child produces the word with flexible rate, and successive approximations of the target are reinforced.

Easy Onsets

Easy onsets refer to an easy or gentle onset of voicing.  Teaching easy onsets is like teaching flexible rate.  The clinician models the target behavior by the use of a lot of different sounds and
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Speech Therapy Fluency Shaping: A Different Approach

By admin on Tuesday, September 30th, 2008 | No Comments

There is a lot of fluency shaping techniques used in speech therapy for fluency disorders. However, due to the advancements of technology, a new kind of fluency shaping approach is now available. This is possible by the use of biofeedback mechanisms.

Fluency Shaping At A Glance

In fluency shaping therapy, motor skills are acquired. But in order to have a successful therapy the client needs to have feedback. Since it involves physically learned behavior, the client should know if what he is doing is right or wrong.

For example, a therapist asks his patient to use diaphragmatic breathing. The client and the speech therapist knows if the client is doing it right or wrong because they could observe it by putting a hand in the patient’s stomach.

On the other hand if the therapist asks the client to execute air with vocal tension, and he does so, and then therapist asks the client to do it faster; it would be hard to observe and see the difference between the two actions. That’s why biofeedback devices were invented.

Biofeedback Mechanisms

A biofeedback mechanism is an instrument that shows the user’s physiological activity’s display and measurement. It is very helpful to
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Toys As Materials For Speech Therapy

By admin on Thursday, September 25th, 2008 | No Comments

There are a variety of tools and materials, which are designed for speech therapy in the market right now, thus giving the therapist much more options when it comes to choosing the equipments that could best maximize his services. One variety of materials are toys. And there are various reasons for the rise in its use.

The Toys and Their Functions

Before the therapy starts, an evaluation of the patient’s oral motor structures is usually done. This is where the therapist inspects the various structures that are inside and around the patient’s mouth that are used for speech. Some of these are the lips, tongue, teeth, jaw and cheeks.

For the structures to be seen more accurately, a penlight is usually used. The only problem with it is that the child may not find it very pleasant to have a flashlight in his mouth. This is now why there already is the colorful and jelly-like oral light system, which gives the same amount of light minus the metallic appearance.

The examination of these muscles also usually requires gloves and tongue depressors; in which kids do not appreciate both of whose smell and taste. This is now the reason why
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Speech Therapy Diagnosis: Autism

By admin on Wednesday, September 24th, 2008 | No Comments

Before a child could undergo speech therapy with the diagnosis of Autism, he should pass a criteria of characteristics first that is given by the DSM-IV. So here are the criteria for a child to be diagnosed with such conditions.

Autistic Disorder Criteria: Social Interaction

First off, a child should have impairment in social interaction. This could be manifested by at least two of the following behaviors. First is a marked impairment with the use of different non-verbal behaviors like facial expression, eye-to-eye gaze, and body posture.

Second is the child’s failure to develop peer relationship that is appropriate for his developmental level. In this case the child may seem to have difficulty gaining friends, or even just relating to other children within his age.

The child may also have the lack of spontaneity to share his emotions and thoughts. He may not share enjoyment, achievements, or interests to other people. In this case, the child doesn’t usually bring or point to objects that interest him.

The lack of emotional reciprocity is also possible. No matter how hard you try to connect or show your emotions and feelings to the child, he wouldn’t care less.

Autistic Disorder Criteria: Communication

The child also has communication impairment. Having at
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The Role of Speech Therapy In Traumatic Brain Injury

By admin on Friday, September 19th, 2008 | No Comments

Traumatic brain injury can cause about a lot of speech and language disorders that would entail the need of speech therapy. That’s why the role of speech therapy in the rehabilitation process of a traumatic brain injury patient is very vital.

What Speech And Language Problems TBI Brings About

A person may have loss of consciousness after a traumatic brain injury. This loss of consciousness can vary from seconds, minutes, hours, days, months or even years. The longer you are out of consciousness, the more severe your injury is. After a traumatic brain injury, you may suffer secondary consequences, which are considered to be more lethal and dangerous than the primary injury.

Some of these secondary consequences include damage to your brain’s meninges, traumatic hematoma, increased intracranial pressure, herniation, hyperventilation, ischemic brain damage, and cerebral vasospasm. When these brain damages occur, they tend to affect parts of your brain that are responsible for speech and language processing and production, thus you get speech and language problems.

Traumatic brain injuries can cause you permanent or temporary memory loss, orientation problems, lesser cognitive performance or slower processing of thought, attention problems, deterioration of skills in basic counting, spelling and writing. You
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Speech Therapy Activities For Aphasia

By admin on Wednesday, September 17th, 2008 | No Comments

To begin with, the primary cause of aphasia should be stabilized or treated. After doing so, that’s the only time that a therapist can work on the rehabilitation of the patient. To recover a person’s language function, he or she should begin undergoing therapy as soon as possible subsequent the injury.

Speech Therapy: As A Treatment For Aphasia

Since there are no surgical or medical procedures that are currently available to treat Aphasia, conditions that result from head injury or stroke can be improved through the treatment of speech therapy.

For majority of Aphasic patients though, the main emphasis is placed upon optimizing the use of the person’s retained language skills and being able to learn to use other ways of communication to be able to compensate for their permanently lost language abilities.

Therapy Activities

The formulation of what activities to use during a speech therapy session is critically done and would highly depend on the therapists’ assessment and diagnosis results on the individual. However, there are some general activities that are done to treat Aphasia.

Exercise

Since most types of Aphasia would include right-sided weakness of the body and sensory loss, it is important for the patient to
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Speech Therapy Assessment Tips For Fluency Disorders

By admin on Tuesday, September 16th, 2008 | No Comments

During the assessment of an individual with suspected fluency disorder, there are some things to remember to make the assessment more comprehensive and useful. Here are some of those critical points to take note of during assessment.

Benefits Of Obtaining Both Reading and Conversation Sample

It is more beneficial to obtain both reading and conversation sample from school children and adults because this would give more reliability and credibility to the samples taken.

Since stuttering varies in different situations, a reading and conversation sample would allow the clinician to see the behaviors of the person in two different tasks. A conversational speech sample is likely to have more variability, while a reading passage would likely have less variability.

Information To Assess Motivation

Through interview, a therapist can learn a lot from his client. In fact, insight about the client’s motivation could be seen by asking the following questions like ”What do you believe caused you to stutter?”, “Has you stuttering changed or caused you more problems recently?, “Why did you come in for help at the present time?”, “ Are there times or situations when you stutter more? Less? What are they?”.

Benefits Of Continuing Evaluation

No individual could be understood in an hour or two; that’s
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Speech Therapy: PROLAM-GM Approach

By admin on Thursday, September 11th, 2008 | No Comments

PROLAM-GM is an acronym for the various intervention and transfer strategies used in the management of stuttering. PROLAM, which stands for physiological adjustments, rate manipulation, operant controls, length and complexity of utterance, attitude changes, and monitoring, are the intervention strategies. GM, which stands for generalization and maintenance, are the transfer strategies.

Physiological Adjustments

Physiological adjustment strategies include tactics that manipulate bodily components known or thought to be involved in the production of stuttered speech. An example of this would be the attempt to use gentle contact between the articulators when talking.

The rationale behind this approach is that the physiological components necessary for the production of normal fluent speech are in some way used inappropriately when stuttering occurs. Therefore, the therapy tactics used will result in a “readjustment” of the disordered component, or in use of compensatory behaviors and strategies.

Rate of Speech Manipulations

Use of a reduced speech rate to modify stuttering operates in the belief that: (a) reduction of rate results in simplification of the physiological speech processes, thus allowing easier synchronization or; (b) reduction in the rate of speech prevents the stutterer from anticipating feared stimuli that result in the production of the stuttering response.

The
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Speech Therapy: An Overview On Fluency Disorders

By admin on Sunday, September 7th, 2008 | No Comments

One of the main categories of speech problems in need for speech therapy are fluency disorders. However, there are different types of fluency disorders, even though they may all seem the same. Each type has its own cause, and defining characteristics that make them stand out from one another.

There are basically six main types of fluency disorders, while some are considered to be other conditions that are related to fluency disorders.

Normal Developmental Disfluency

Normal developmental disfluency, is a fluency disorder that is a lot of times mistaken to be stuttering. This condition occurs with children from ages 1:6- 6 years old, although the peak of the condition is considered to be 2-4 years of age.

A lot of parents may be concerned of the way their child speaks, but in reality, this is a normal condition that every child goes through. Normal developmental disfluency is a normal part of a child’s development. So there is really no need to worry at all.

A child would normally get over this stage as his speech skills develop. However, a proper environment, and interaction is needed for that to happen. If a child is pressured by his parents or people
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Therapy Procedures for Speech Disorders

By admin on Saturday, September 6th, 2008 | No Comments

The terminal goal of speech therapy is for the client to spontaneously use the appropriate speech sounds of his or her linguistic culture in connected speech. In this context, therapy becomes a continuum of short-term goals designed to meet the terminal goal. And therapy procedures may either use the motor or traditional approach or the cognitive-linguistic approach.

Motor or Traditional Approach

This approach is structure-based and uses drills more. Drills are activities that have rapid rates of stimulus presentation and which puts much stress on accuracy of the patient’s response to the stimulus and the said response reaching various set criteria.

Under this approach is auditory training. Its proponent is Charles Van Riper. This procedure uses pictures and games as motivational events or events that serve as a way of presenting stimuli. Activities are mainly about speech sound discrimination. It highlights the awareness and detection of sound.

Another procedure is the exercise of the oral motor structures. It is used when an oral motor assessment shows muscle weakness or spasticity. For children, it should be made fun and functional. It also uses mirrors for visual feedback.

One other procedure under this approach is phonetic placement. Van Riper was also
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