Purpose: Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) impacts bulbar and respiratory musculature, which may contribute to impaired swallow function (dysphagia) and respiratory-swallow coordination. The purpose of this pilot study was to examine if respiratory-swallow coordination in individuals with ALS was perturbed compared to healthy controls. We…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine a potential increased cognitive processing bottleneck within Parkinson disease (PD) by extending a previous overlapping task methodology. Additionally, this study extends previous overlapping task methodology in PD to examine the influence of modality (vocal vs. manual) on response delays in…

Purpose: Within-individual pharyngeal swallowing pressure variability differs among pharyngeal regions in healthy individuals and increases with age. It remains unknown if pharyngeal pressure variability is impacted by volitional swallowing tasks. We hypothesized that pressure variability would increase during volitional swallowing maneuvers and…

Purpose: While dysarthria and dysphagia are known bulbar manifestations of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), the relative prevalence of speech and swallowing impairments and whether these bulbar symptoms emerge at the same time point or progress at similar rates is not yet clear. We, therefore, sought to determine the relative prevalence of…

Purpose: Almost 90% of people with Parkinson's disease (PD) develop voice and speech disorders during the course of the disease. Ventilatory dysfunction is one of the main causes. We aimed to evaluate relationships between respiratory impairments and speech/voice changes in PD. Method: At Day 15 from admission, in consecutive clinically stable PD…

Purpose: Children with childhood apraxia of speech (CAS) evidence a high rate of co-occurring fine and gross motor deficits. This clinical focus article reports a preliminary investigation of characteristics of developmental coordination disorder (DCD), a neurodevelopmental disorder categorized by poor motor proficiency and functional limitations,…

Purpose: Dysphagia is thought to be prevalent and a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in people with Parkinson disease (PwPD). The aim of this study was to compare the frequencies of atypical and extreme values for measures of swallowing physiology in PwPD and in an age- and sex-matched cohort of healthy adults. Atypical and extreme values…

Purpose: Patients with poststroke dysphagia may experience inefficient bolus clearance or inadequate airway protection. Following a stroke, impairments in lingual pressure generation capacity are thought to contribute to oropharyngeal dysphagia. The goal of our study was to determine whether similar profiles of swallowing impairment would be seen…

In adults with neuromuscular conditions illness perceptions show a strong relation with QoL. For young patients, illness perceptions are shaped through interaction with their parents. A shared perception between child and parent may benefit the child's QoL. This study investigated agreement in illness perceptions of children with Spinal Muscular…

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the presence and progression of self-perceived speech and swallowing impairments in newly diagnosed people with Parkinson's disease (PD) longitudinally across 6 years. Method: Longitudinal data from the Parkinson's Progression Markers Initiative were analyzed across six consecutive years in a…

Purpose: Oral diadochokinesis (DDK) is a standard dysarthria assessment task. To extract automatic and semi-automatic DDK measurements, numerous DDK analysis algorithms based on acoustic signal processing are available, including amplitude based, spectral based, and hybrid. However, these algorithms have been predominantly validated in individuals…

Background: Whilst dysphagia is a commonly reported complication of stroke, it has received relatively little attention in the literature for patients following non-traumatic subarachnoid haemorrhage (SAH). Aims: To investigate dysphagia incidence, risk factors, clinical progression and recovery in patients following non-traumatic SAH. Methods…

Data supporting theoretical models linking autism spectrum disorders (ASD) to motor disturbance are inconclusive. In the present study, children and adolescents with ASD (n = 44) were compared with a matched group of typically developing individuals (n = 49) on both instrumental and observational assessments of motor abnormalities. No group…

Dysphagia (impaired swallowing) is known to contribute to decreased quality of life, and increased length of hospital stay and mortality post-stroke. Despite the advancements in stroke treatment with the introduction of thrombolysis and endovascular clot retrieval (ECR), patients continue to present with high rates of dysphagia. Speech and…

Purpose: The purpose of this article was to validate a novel acoustic analysis of oral diadochokinesis (DDK) in assessing bulbar motor involvement in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Method: An automated acoustic DDK analysis was developed, which filtered out the voice features and extracted the envelope of the acoustic waveform reflecting the…