Silverman Voice Treatment

Speech and language services: This service can support people who have had a stroke and have problems with their speech.

W.C., a 26 year 11 month old woman, was brought to the Florida Atlantic University-Communication Disorders Clinic (FAU-CDC) by her boyfriend for a Speech-Language Evaluation. She was referred to the FAU-CDC by her neurologist for word finding difficulties and a possible articulation disorder after a left hemisphere hemorrhagic stroke one month ago. According to her boyfriend, W.C.’s symptoms began immediately following her stroke and are characterized by word finding difficulties, slowed and choppy speech, and mispronunciation of certain consonants that is affecting intelligibility along with a strained voice.

To assess Jeffrey’s speech sound production, a conversational speech sample was recorded. Jeffrey’s speech sound production was assessed in both known and unknown conversational contexts.

An interview was conducted in which the client’s mother stated that she feels that Tommy’s voice quality is becoming progressively worse. Tommy has also begun to perceive the difference compared to his peers. He stated, “I sound different from all of my friends at school. They say ‘Tommy, what’s wrong with you? Why do you sound like that?’” In response to his friends’ inquisitiveness about his voice, Mrs. Callahan stated that Tommy is becoming less talkative. During the interview, a connected speech sample was taken whereby Tommy was asked to read the Limpy standard reading passage aloud. Low pitch and hoarseness were evident during the

The second article, A Methodology for Assessing the Functions of Emerging Speech in Children with Developmental Disabilities by Lerman, Parten, Addison, Vorndran, Volkert, & Kodak, 2005 (2005), is about an experimental study aimed to develop and evaluate

CAPE-V is an auditory method of evaluating voice quality. The CAPE-V was created to provide a consistent scale and consistent parameters for professionals evaluating the voice while also allowing clinicians to identity differences among a client’s voice (Nagle, 2016, 47). Clinicians determine if a person has a voice disorder or if a person has a normal voice. Six voice qualities are specifically examined when a CAPE-V is used; however, the evaluation includes blank lines to allow a clinician to write additional voice features he or she perceives that are not originally listed on the CAPE-V form. Qualities examined by a professional utilizing a CAPE-V are overall severity, roughness, breathiness, pitch, and loudness. A tick mark is placed on a visual analog scale to denote the severity of each vocal quality; the left portion of the scale signifies a normal vocal quality, while the right portion of the scale represents an extreme deviance in voice parameters. The assessment requires the client sustain vowels /a/ and /i/, read six sentences, and speak in a conversational manner to the statement, “Tell me about your voice.” Prolonged vowels enable a clinical to hear a client’s voice with no articulatory influences, speaking the sentences permits a professional to evaluate specific voice qualities, and conversational speech allows a clinician to further assess a client’s voice for abnormalities (Kempster et al., 2009, pp. 126-127). Clinicians agree that

The participation model begins by identifying the participation patterns and communication needs where the clinician then identifies participation barriers (Beukelman & Mirenda, 2013, p. 108). SLP’s are then taught to differentiate between assessing opportunity barriers and assessing access barriers in the concept that the working clinician evaluates policy, practice, facilitator skill, facilitator knowledge, attitude, and current communication (Beukelman & Mirenda, 2013, p. 108). The client’s current communication assessment includes a full assessment of their possible potential to increase natural abilities, an assessment of potential environmental adaptations, and an assessment of the potential to utilize AAC systems or devices (Beukelman & Mirenda, 2013, p. 108). Once there has been a thorough analysis the speech language pathologist should plan and implement interventions that will span across the present and the future with a follow up to determine how effective the intervention has been in advancing a client’s participation (Beukelman & Mirenda, 2013, p.

Fortunately, there are numerous resources available for people with disabilities that offer assistance and programs to meet their everyday needs. The Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind serves as an educational resource for individuals who are deaf, blind, deaf-blind, and multi-disabled. I decided to research this agency because it has been referenced in my communicative disorders classes. As a future speech language pathologist, I want to learn about this agency and discover the programs it offers to help me with my future clients. The Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind is relative to this course because as mentioned in the textbook and other course material, resources and programs that offer assistance to individuals with disabilities are essential to their successful futures. This agency is a means in which people who are deaf and blind can seek assistance to improve their skills of communication, and this is ultimately my goal as a speech language pathologist.

The human brain is an enormously complex and intricate structure; however, it is incredibly susceptible to injury and irreversible damage. Traumatic brain injuries can affect any member of the population at any given moment, damaging vital areas of the brain responsible for an entire spectrum of tasks, most of which are often taken for granted. Numerous medical professionals are involved in the rehabilitation of patients that sustain traumatic brain injuries. Because traumatic brain injuries have such a profound effect on human speech production, speech-language pathologists are needed in the both the diagnostic and rehabilitation process. In order to fully comprehend the significance of the role that speech-language pathologists play in the rehabilitation of TBI patients, the cause, diagnostic process, physiological and psychological effects, and treatment of traumatic brain injuries must be considered.

In Intensive Voice Treatment (LSVT LOUD) for Children With Spastic Cerebral Palsy and Dysarthria by Fox, Cynthia Marie, Boliek and Carol Ann, the participants were five children between the ages of 5 and 7 years with a medical diagnosis of predominantly spastic Cerebral Palsy. A telephone screening questionnaire was first given to the parents and then the children went through a face-to-face screening process to be considered for the study. To be selected for this study participants had to have Dysarthria, hearing that was within normal limits or close enough to normal limits, no vocal fold pathology as determined by an otolaryngologist, the ability to follow directions for the study tasks, and on stable medications if needed.

After listening to this individual’s voice, one could infer that this individual has an overall severe voice problem. I determined this because of voices I have heard on a daily basis. This individual’s voice seemed very rough and there was a lot of strain. This individual’s sounded exhausted and forced when they tried to produce

To compare data and evaluate acoustic characteristics, a total number of 14 participants were used. That being said, seven of the participants were healthy females while the latter were seven female patients who had Parkinson disease. The main features of these subjects were recorded including their age, duration after diagnosis, mini-mental state examination, functional independence measure, ambulatory function, and ratings on the Hahn and Yahr scale (Bang, Min, Sohn, & Cho 2013). Each subject was analyzed according to their vocalization of four vowel sounds that are on the corners of the vowel quadrilateral including /a/ the low back unrounded vowel, /e/ the low front unrounded vowel, /i/ the high front unrounded vowel, and /u/ the high back rounded vowel. The procedure consisted of a

I interviewed a male over sixty years of age. He does not have a voice disorder, but he is at risk for developing one. Along with his age, his past has contributed to increasing his risk. His environmental factors have also increased his likelihood of developing a voice disorder.

With this goal in mind, this case definition provides a means of assessing speech and language disorder patients as they may present in primary care and does not rely (but may be modified to include) linkage to other care settings or health practitioners. This case definition may also

In addition, there is the barrier of cost. Since, the intervention equipment itself is not easily obtained by speech pathologists, a strong evidence base with more large scale randomized studies is necessary to justify the cost of this intervention method. Currently, many of the studies examining this method of intervention are comprised of a small case series or a single case study due to the wide variation in articulatory errors assessed by this method of therapy. It is generally accepted that it is difficult to stereotype the articulatory patterns of deaf and hard of hearing individuals, due to the wide range of variability in segmental production between and within speakers of normal hearing (Vuckovich, M. 2006). For this reason, this intervention method has largely been evaluated via case series. However, adjusting targets to examine a more comprehensive battery of sounds would allow for a larger sample size and randomized design.