Speech Disorders
There are many types of speech disorders ranging from:
- Muteness
- Stuttering
- Lisps and other orofacial myofunctional disorders are often seen in young children and infants who thrust out their tongues in an exaggerated manner while speaking.
- Dysprosody or speech sound disorders
- Dysarthria or motor speech disorders caused by weak or paralyzed speech muscles
- Apraxia in which the sounds or various syllables in a word may be pronounced in the wrong order.
Dysprosody, dysarthria, and apraxia are often the result of neurological impairment caused by head or neck trauma, surgical accidents, strokes, or progressive illnesses such as Parkinson’s disease, multiple sclerosis, Huntingdon’s disease, and others.
Treatments vary depending on the cause of the speech disorder.
With lisps and orofacial myofunctional disorders, treatment therapies usually center around making the patient aware of the various muscles that control the mouth. The repetition of different exercises that will strengthen these muscles and coordinate their interaction is common, as well as an exaggerated expression of correct mouth postures and production of speech sounds.
In dysarthria which is caused by muscle weakness, paralysis, or reduced coordination in the motor-speech system, the patient is likely to be also affected by problems swallowing, or inability to control their tongue, lips, lungs, or throat. Treatment involves repetition of exercises designed to improve control over, and strength of, the articulator muscles which may have become either over tight or weak and flaccid.
Most speech disorder treatment therapies center around the principles of motor learning which call for repetition of therapy at frequent intervals, patience, continuous practice over long periods, and progressively more difficult muscular challenges.
The key to success with this type of motor learning therapy is in part dependent on patients having reliable and consistent third-party support.