Motor Speech Disorders Unit

 MOTOR SPEECH DISORDERS 

What is Dysarthria?

In order to speak, we need the tongue, lips, face, throat and respiratory muscles to work together and in a coordinated manner. If there is incoordination in these muscles, problems may occur in speech production. Dysarthria happens when you have weak muscles due to brain damage. It is a motor speech disorder and can be mild or severe.

Causes

Brain damage causes dysarthria. It can happen at birth or after an illness or injury. Anything that causes brain damage can cause dysarthria, such as:

  • Stroke
  • Brain injury
  • Tumors
  • Parkinson's disease
  • Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS)
  • Huntington's disease
  • Multiple sclerosis
  • Cerebral palsy
  • Muscular dystrophy

Treatment

Your work with the SLP will depend on the type of dysarthria you have and how severe it is. You may work on:

  • Slowing down your speech.
  • Using more breath to speak louder.
  • Making your mouth muscles stronger.
  • Moving your lips and tongue more.
  • Saying sounds clearly in words and sentences.
  • Using other ways to communicate, like gestures, writing, or using computers. This is augmentative and alternative communication, or AAC.

What is Apraxia?

Apraxia of speech is a neurologic speech disorder that reflects an impaired capacity to plan or program sensorimotor commands necessary for directing movements that result in phonetically and prosodically normal speech (Duffy, 2013).

Signs and Symptoms

  • Inability to pronounce sounds correctly, saying a different word or a meaningless word instead of the desired word
  • Adding new sounds to words while speaking, making meaningless or incorrect additions
  • Inconsistent word production
  • Problems in articulation, speech rate, prosody and fluency

Causes

  • Stroke
  • Traumatic brain injury
  • Tumor
  • Surgical trauma Progressive disease

Treatment

After detailed evaluations, patients with apraxia are determined by the speech and language therapist. A therapy program is prepared and implemented in line with the purposes such as the correct use of structures involved in speech mechanism, training the muscles involved in voice production, and providing the appropriate speed and rhythm for speech. In case of need, alternative communication methods are provided to the patient by using gesture-mimic, sign, writing or computer-aided programs.

     

For clinical evaluation, intervention sessions or more information, please apply to our Secretariat of the Department of Speech and Language Therapy.

Department Secretary: Yeliz ŞEN

Contact Number: 0312 216 26 24

https://sbf-dkt.gazi.edu.tr/view/page/278972

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