Direction-Specific Jaw Dysfunction and Its Impact on Tongue Movement in Individuals With Dysarthria Secondary to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis

2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (2) ◽  
pp. 499-508 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jimin Lee ◽  
Elizabeth Rodriguez ◽  
Antje Mefferd

Purpose The current study tested jaw movement characteristics and their impact on tongue movement for speech production in individuals with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Specifically, the study examined tongue and jaw movement in multiple directions during jaw opening and closing strokes in individuals with ALS and controls. Method Twenty-two individuals with ALS and 22 controls participated in the current study. Tongue and jaw movements during the production of the words “Iowa” and “Ohio” (produced in a carrier phrase) were recorded using electromagnetic articulography. Tongue and jaw distances were measured for jaw opening and closing strokes. Distance was measured in the anterior–posterior and superior–inferior dimensions (retraction, advancement, lowering, and raising). Results Findings revealed that individuals with ALS exaggerated their jaw opening movements, but not their jaw closing movements, compared to controls. Between the groups, a comparable tongue lowering distance was observed during jaw opening movements. In contrast, reduced tongue raising was observed during the jaw closing movements in individuals with ALS compared to controls. Conclusion The findings suggest that individuals with ALS produce excessive jaw opening movements in the absence of excessive jaw closing movements. The lack of excessive jaw closing movements results in reduced tongue raising in these individuals. Excessive jaw opening movements alone suggest a direction-specific jaw dysfunction. Future studies should examine whether excessive jaw raising can be facilitated and if it enhances tongue raising movement for speech production in individuals with dysarthria secondary to ALS.

2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 258-269 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jimin Lee ◽  
Michael Bell ◽  
Zachary Simmons

Purpose The current study investigated whether articulatory kinematic patterns can be extrapolated across the spectrum of dysarthria severity in individuals with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Method Temporal and spatial articulatory kinematic data were collected using electromagnetic articulography from 14 individuals with dysarthria secondary to ALS and 6 typically aging speakers. Speech intelligibility and speaking rate were used as indices of severity. Results Temporal measures (duration, speed of articulators) were significantly correlated with both indices of severity. In speakers with dysarthria, spatial measures were not correlated with severity except in 3 measures: tongue movement displacement was more reduced in the anterior–posterior dimension; jaw movement distance was greater in the inferior–superior dimension; jaw convex hull area was larger in speakers with slower speaking rates. Visual inspection of movement trajectories revealed that overall spatial kinematic characteristics in speakers with severe dysarthria differed qualitatively from those in speakers with mild or moderate dysarthria. Unlike speakers with dysarthria, typically aging speakers displayed variable tongue movement and minimal jaw movement. Conclusions The current study revealed that spatial articulatory characteristics, unlike temporal characteristics, showed a complicated pattern across the severity spectrum. The findings suggest that articulatory characteristics in speakers with severe dysarthria cannot simply be extrapolated from those in speakers with mild-to-moderate dysarthria secondary to ALS.


2018 ◽  
Vol 27 (3) ◽  
pp. 996-1009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jimin Lee ◽  
Michael Bell

Purpose The current study examined overall articulatory range of movement (ROM) in individuals with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Differential involvement of articulators was also tested using articulatory working space in individuals with varying degrees of dysarthria severity and in typically aging individuals. A strong association between overall articulatory ROM and severity measures among individuals with ALS was hypothesized. In addition, it was hypothesized that differential involvement of articulators would be detected using overall articulatory ROM measures. Method Twenty-two speakers with dysarthria secondary to ALS and 22 typically aging speakers participated. Speech intelligibility and speaking rate were used as indices of severity. Movement range and overall articulatory working space area (convex hull) of the tongue, lower lip, and jaw were each measured by electromagnetic articulography while the speakers produced the Rainbow Passage. Results Tongue convex hull size was significantly correlated with both indices of severity. A significant interaction between articulators and groups was observed. Individuals with severe dysarthria had reduced tongue convex hull size and exaggerated lower lip convex hull size. ROM in the anterior–posterior dimension showed a more notable differential involvement pattern than ROM in the superior–inferior dimension. Results in the area under a receiver operating characteristic curve analysis revealed group-specific ROM sensitivity. Conclusions The findings indicate that tongue ROM is reduced in individuals with more severe dysarthria when estimated using a standardized paragraph containing all American English phonemes. The articulatory working space measure could be useful for estimating speech dysfunction in ALS. ROM of the tongue decreases, but ROM of the lower lip and jaw each increase in individuals with severe dysarthria. Differential involvement of the articulators in the anterior–posterior dimension needs to be further investigated.


2020 ◽  
Vol 63 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-73 ◽  
Author(s):  
Panying Rong

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 temporal pattern of syllable repetitions during an oral DDK task (i.e., repetitions of /tɑ/ at the maximum rate on 1 breath). Cycle-to-cycle temporal variability (cTV) of envelope fluctuations and syllable repetition rate (sylRate) were derived from the envelope and validated against 2 kinematic measures, which are tongue movement jitter (movJitter) and alternating tongue movement rate (AMR) during the DDK task, in 16 individuals with bulbar ALS and 18 healthy controls. After the validation, cTV, sylRate, movJitter, and AMR, along with an established clinical speech measure, that is, speaking rate (SR), were compared in their ability to (a) differentiate individuals with ALS from healthy controls and (b) detect early-stage bulbar declines in ALS. Results cTV and sylRate were significantly correlated with movJitter and AMR, respectively, across individuals with ALS and healthy controls, confirming the validity of the acoustic DDK analysis in extracting the temporal DDK pattern. Among all the acoustic and kinematic DDK measures, cTV showed the highest diagnostic accuracy (i.e., 0.87) with 80% sensitivity and 94% specificity in differentiating individuals with ALS from healthy controls, which outperformed the SR measure. Moreover, cTV showed a large increase during the early disease stage, which preceded the decline of SR. Conclusions This study provided preliminary validation of a novel automated acoustic DDK analysis in extracting a useful measure, namely, cTV, for early detection of bulbar ALS. This analysis overcame a major barrier in the existing acoustic DDK analysis, which is continuous voicing between syllables that interferes with syllable structures. This approach has potential clinical applications as a novel bulbar assessment.


2003 ◽  
Vol 46 (5) ◽  
pp. 1247-1261 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary Weismer ◽  
Yana Yunusova ◽  
John R. Westbury

Articulatory discoordination is often said to be an important feature of the speech production disorder in dysarthria, but little experimental work has been done to identify and specify the coordination difficulties. The present study evaluated the coordination of labial and lingual gestures for /u/ production in persons with Parkinson's disease (PD), amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and in control participants. Both tongue backing/raising and reduction of the area enclosed by the lips can produce the characteristic low F2 of /u/. The timing of these articulatory gestures with respect to the acoustic target of a low F2 was inferred from X-ray microbeam data. Pellet motions of the tongue dorsum and lips revealed the timing of the lingual and labial gestures to be strongly linked together (synchronized), predictive of the temporal location of the lowest F2 within the vocalic nucleus, and scaled proportionately to the overall vowel duration in control participants. Somewhat surprisingly, essentially the same findings were obtained in the speakers with dysarthria. These relationships were noisier among the speakers with dysarthria, but the global synchronization patterns applied to all 3 groups. Further analyses revealed the synchronization to be less well defined and more variable across speakers with ALS, as compared to speakers with PD and the controls. Results are discussed relative to concepts of coordination in dysarthria.


1995 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karen A. Renout ◽  
Herbert A. Leeper ◽  
Donna L. Bandur ◽  
Arthur J. Hudson

This study relates over time the changes in voluntary opening and closing of the vocal folds (vocal fold diadochokinesis, or VFDDK) of patients with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The rate, pattern, and periodicity of VFDDK were examined for 12 ALS subjects with bulbar and 14 subjects with nonbulbar signs of the disease. The acoustical data were analyzed with a commercially available computer-based speech analysis system. ALS patients with bulbar and nonbulbar symptoms demonstrate reduced rate and aperiodic VFDDK as the symptomatology of the neuromotor system progresses. Individuals with bulbar signs show a greater change in vocal fold activity than do the nonbulbar group. Discussion of the clinical implications for initial diagnosis and monitoring of changes over time in motor control of laryngeal function is presented.


Author(s):  
Panying Rong ◽  
Lindsey Heidrick

Purpose This study examined the articulatory control of speech and speechlike tasks in individuals with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and neurologically healthy individuals with the aim to identify the most useful set of articulatory features and tasks for assessing bulbar motor involvement in ALS. Method Tongue and jaw kinematics were recorded in 12 individuals with bulbar ALS and 10 healthy controls during a speech task and two speechlike tasks (i.e., alternating motion rate [AMR], sequential motion rate [SMR]). Eight articulatory features were derived for each participant per task, including the range, maximum speed, and acceleration time of tongue and jaw movements as well as the coupling and timing between tongue and jaw movements. The effects of task (i.e., AMR, SMR, speech) and group (i.e., ALS, control) on these articulatory features were evaluated. For each feature, the task that yielded the largest difference between the ALS and control groups was identified. The diagnostic efficacy of these task-specific features was assessed using the receiver operating characteristic analysis; the relation of these task-specific features to a well-established bulbar severity index—speaking rate—was determined using Spearman's rank correlation. Results Seven task-specific articulatory features were identified, including (a) tongue and jaw acceleration time during the AMR task, (b) tongue–jaw coupling during the SMR task, and (c) range of tongue movement, maximum tongue and jaw speed, and temporal lag between tongue and jaw movements during the speech task. Among these features, tongue and jaw acceleration time and their temporal lag showed relatively high accuracy (i.e., 0.83–0.95) in differentiating individuals with ALS from healthy controls. Range of tongue movement and maximum tongue and jaw speed showed significant correlations with speaking rate. Conclusion Findings provided preliminary evidence for the utility of task-specific articulatory measurements as a novel quantitative assessment to detect and predict bulbar motor involvement in ALS.


2015 ◽  
Vol 151 ◽  
pp. 130-138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pedro Gómez-Vilda ◽  
Ana Rita M. Londral ◽  
Victoria Rodellar-Biarge ◽  
José M. Ferrández-Vicente ◽  
Mamede de Carvalho

2004 ◽  
Vol 16 (6) ◽  
pp. 579-586 ◽  
Author(s):  
Akihisa Okino ◽  
◽  
Hideaki Takanobu ◽  
Atsuo Takanishi ◽  
Kayoko Ohtsuki ◽  
...  

This paper discusses a jaw movement training robot implementing a 6-DOF (degrees of freedom) parallel mechanism, and its application to mouth opening and closing and lateral movement training. Temporomandibular joints (TMJ) syndrome prevents patients from opening their mouths or moving their jaws easily due to problems with mandibular joints, mastication muscles, and other organs involved in food chewing. Conventional therapy involves simple mouth opening apparatuses, although individual techniques vary with the physician. We developed and improved a jaw movement training robot that aids jaw opening and closing and lateral jaw movement training. This system consists of a 6-DOF slave manipulator representing a patient manipulator and a 2-DOF or 3-DOF master manipulator representing the doctor command manipulator.


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