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: This study compared the concordance between two validated videofluoroscopic pharyngeal residue outcome scales used in clinical and research settings: the Dynamic Imaging Grade of Swallowing Toxicity (DIGEST) and the Analysis of Swallowing Physiology: Events, Kinematics and Timing (ASPEKT) percent residue metric. Method: Two trained raters…

Purpose: The prevalence of dysphagia in patients with neurodegenerative diseases (ND) is alarmingly high and frequently results in morbidity and accelerated mortality due to subsequent adverse events (e.g., aspiration pneumonia). Swallowing in patients with ND should be continuously monitored due to the progressive disease nature. Access to…

Purpose: Unexpected and sustained manipulations of auditory feedback during speech production result in "reflexive" and "adaptive" responses, which can shed light on feedback and feedforward auditory-motor control processes, respectively. Persons with Parkinson's disease (PwPD) have shown aberrant reflexive and adaptive…

Purpose: Reduced stress commonly occurs in talkers with Parkinson's disease (PD), whereas excessive and equal stress is frequently associated with dysarthria of talkers with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and multiple sclerosis (MS). This study sought to identify articulatory impairment patterns that underlie these two impaired stress…

This pilot study investigates the feasibility and assesses the impact of "Lactobacillus plantarum" PS128 probiotics on the neurological function in Rett syndrome. We conducted a randomized, double-blind, and placebo-controlled trial on Rett syndrome with MECP2 mutation aged between 1 and 50 years in Taiwan. In this pilot study,…

Background: The articulatory accuracy of patients with dysarthria is one of the most affected speech dimensions with a high impact on speech intelligibility. Behavioural treatments of articulation can either involve direct or indirect approaches. The latter have been thoroughly investigated and are generally appreciated for their almost immediate…

Purpose: The clinical diagnosis of motor speech disorders (MSDs) is mainly based on perceptual approaches. However, studies on perceptual classification of MSDs often indicate low classification accuracy. The aim of this study was to determine in a forced-choice dichotomous decision-making task (a) how accuracy of speech-language pathologists…

Purpose: We proposed and tested a causal instantiation of the World Health Organization's International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) framework, linking acoustics, intelligibility, and communicative participation in the context of dysarthria. Method: Speech samples and communicative participation scores were collected…

Background: Oropharyngeal dysphagia and laryngeal dysfunction are two lesser known complications after lung and heart transplantation. The presence of these features places this immunocompromised population at high risk of pulmonary complications and subsequent medical deterioration. Early identification of swallowing and voice dysfunction would…

Creativity is considered to be one of the most important characteristics that humans possess. It emerges from fundamental cognitive operations and the activation of specific brain regions. In several neurological disorders, such as frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and Parkinson's disease (PD), creativity plays an important role in diagnosis and…

Purpose: To evaluate the factorial and concurrent validity and internal consistency reliability of the World Health Organization Disability Assessment Schedule 2.0 (WHODAS 2.0) 12-item version in persons with spinal cord injuries. Method: Two hundred forty-seven adults with spinal cord injuries completed an online survey consisting of the WHODAS…

Dysfunctions of the human mirror neuron system have been postulated to underlie some deficits in autism spectrum disorders including poor imitative performance and impaired social skills. Using three reaction time experiments addressing mirror neuron system functions under simple and complex conditions, we examined 20 adult autism spectrum…