Virtual Reality (VR) is rapidly gaining popularity as a consumer technology, yet accessibility has not been prioritized. VR enables users to interact with immersive virtual worlds, but effective interaction requires the ability to perceive and navigate the environment. Fortunately, over the past thirty years, hundreds of scene-viewing and…

Background: Speech-language pathologists (SLPs) perform nasal laryngoscopy (LE) to assess voice and dysphagia-related disorders. The procedural aspects may include the use of topical nasal anaesthesia. Aims: To explore the practice patterns of American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA)-certified SLPs use of anaesthesia during laryngeal…

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…

This study is qualitative phenomenological research. A Total of 32 respondents consented participation and were purposively selected. The study key question was: How do students with disabilities benefit from inclusive education settings in secondary schools in Tanzania? In-depth interviews and focus group discussions used to collect data, and the…

Purpose: The elements of impaired swallowing biomechanics are visually assessed and scored by clinicians using a standardized and validated tool for assessing type and severity of physiological impairments using the Modified Barium Swallow Impairment Profile (MBSImP). However, the functional anatomical correlates that underly noted impairments…

Background: The development of communication, speech and language follows three stages (development of the parent--child relationship, interactions and actual speech and language acquisition). Children born with cleft lip and/or palate are at increased risk of communicative problems while parents may be going through an emotionally difficult time.…

Vocational training, aimed mainly at the most vulnerable groups of unemployed, was introduced in Spain during the 1980s, at a time of rising unemployment. Since then, its main objective has been integrating these people into the labour market; however, the results are unsatisfactory. In this regard, the seven focus group interviews carried out in…

This study utilises diversity dolls to elicit young children's perceptions of visual disabilities. The study which involved 20 participants aged between six to seven years old suggests that although many children have positive attitudes towards peers with physical disabilities, attitudes are often grounded in the deficit medical model, with…

Purpose: The aim of this study was to examine the relationships of clinical measures of lingual and perihyoid strength with displacement swallowing kinematics and swallowing safety in a heterogenous group of dysphagic adults. Method: A retrospective analysis was completed of videofluoroscopic swallow studies of consecutive dysphagic outpatient…

Social media platforms are rich and dynamic spaces where individuals communicate on a person-to-person level and to broader audiences. These platforms provide a wealth of publicly available data that can shed light on the lived experiences of people from numerous clinical populations. Twitter can be used to examine individual expressions and…

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: Information on reliability of outcome measures used to assess the effectiveness of interventions in dysphagia rehabilitation is lacking, particularly when used by different research groups. Here, we report on reliability of the penetration- aspiration scale (PAS) and temporal and clearance measures, determined using videofluoroscopy.…

Background: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has renewed interest in the use of ultrasound (US) amongst dysphagia-trained clinicians working with infants and children. US is a portable, minimally intrusive tool which carries reduced risk of aerosol-generation provoked by other instrumental swallowing assessment tools such as…

Microaggressions are daily insults to individuals that communicate messages of exclusion, inferiority, and abnormality. The term microaggression was originally used to explain the experiences of racial minorities. This term has also been used to explain the experiences of other individuals with oppressed identities. More recently, the term ableist…

While early literature in accessibility services in postsecondary education largely focused on physically disabled students, their presence in the peer-reviewed literature from 1951-2012 was described as sparse by Gelbar et al. (2015). The studies that existed were largely descriptive, and no studies investigated the effectiveness of…