Successful and rapid response of speech bulb reduction program combined with speech therapy in velopharyngeal dysfunction: a case report

Abstract

Velopharyngeal dysfunction in cleft palate patients following the primary palate repair may result in nasal air emission, hypernasality, articulation disorder and poor intelligibility of speech. Among conservative treatment methods, speech aid prosthesis combined with speech therapy is widely used method. However because of its long time of treatment more than a year and low predictability, some clinicians prefer a surgical intervention. Thus, the purpose of this report was to increase an attention on the effectiveness of speech aid prosthesis by introducing a case that was successfully treated. In this clinical report, speech bulb reduction program with intensive speech therapy was applied for a patient with velopharyngeal dysfunction and it was rapidly treated by 5months which was unusually short period for speech aid therapy. Furthermore, advantages of pre-operative speech aid therapy were discussed.

Keywords: Speech aid prosthesis; Speech bulb; Speech therapy; VPD; VPI; Velopharyngeal dysfunction; Velopharyngeal incompetence; Velopharyngeal insufficiency.

Fig. 1

Changes of nasalance score for vowels before and after placement of the speech aids