Effects of lingual strength training on lingual strength and articulator function in stroke patients with dysarthria.
Jong Hoon Moon, Deok Gi Hong, Kye Ho Kim and 5 others
PMID 28744047WHAT IT FOUND
Stroke patients with dysarthria who added tongue strength training to usual physical and occupational therapy improved tongue pressure and the /tə/ syllable rate more than usual therapy alone.
Only 16 patients were studied, and other speech measures did not differ.
Key findings
01The group that added tongue strength training to usual physical and occupational therapy showed larger change values in maximum tongue pressure (4.75 ± 1.49 vs 0.63 ± 0.92) and /tə/ rate (0.70 ± 0.54 vs 0.12 ± 0.26) than the control group.
02Within the training group, maximum tongue pressure rose from 21.7 ± 2.3 to 26.5 ± 2.7, /tə/ rate rose from 15.7 ± 2.3 to 16.4 ± 2.5, and sequential syllable rate rose from 6.2 ± 1.0 to 6.8 ± 1.0; the control group showed no significant change.
03The between-group comparison did not show a significant difference for /pə/, /cə/, or sequential syllable rate.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
Only 16 patients were studied, with 8 in each group, so the findings could be unstable. The outcomes were only clinical tools such as tongue pressure and syllable rates, not everyday speech or communication. There was no long-term follow-up after the four-week training. Both groups received conventional physical and occupational therapy, so the study tests an add-on package, not tongue training alone.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that tongue strength training alone improves speech in stroke patients with dysarthria. Both groups also received conventional physical and occupational therapy, the sample had only 8 people per group, and several articulation measures did not differ between groups.