Chapter 17: Motor Speech Disorders in Adults

• Apraxia of Speech: Deficit in neural motor planning or programming of the articulatory muscles for voluntary movements for speech, that primarily effects articulation and prosody
• Automatic Speech


  over-learned sequences of words that can be recited without much conscious thought (such as counting to 10, saying days of week, months of year, alphabet, birthday song, etc.)
• Oral Apraxia


  Difficulty with volitional nonspeech movements of the articulators (ex. puffing cheeks, clicking tongue, etc.)
• plateau


  patient's general leveling off of improvement in rehabilitation after which gains are slower and less easily documented
• Tremors at Rest


  tremors that occur when the head, limbs, hands, or fingers are not intentionally being moved
• Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS, Lou Gehrig's Disease)


  A rare, rapidly progressive degenerative disease of motor neurons that control movement of all muscle systems, including speech systems
• Anarthric (Anarthria)


  a complete or near complete loss of the ability to articulate speech
• Myasthenia Gravis


  neuromuscular disorder more commonly seen in women than men. Characterized by chronic fatigue and muscle weakness, especially in facial and articulatory muscles, resulting in dysarthria
• differential diagnosis


  process of narrowing possibilities and reaching conclusions about the nature of a deficit