Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2023 Mar 7;66(3):791-803.
doi: 10.1044/2022_JSLHR-22-00436. Epub 2023 Feb 16.

Comorbidity and Severity in Childhood Apraxia of Speech: A Retrospective Chart Review

Karen V Chenausky  1   2 , Becky Baas  3 , Ruth Stoeckel  3 , Taylor Brown  3 , Jordan R Green  1   4 , Cassandra Runke  5 , Lisa Schimmenti  5 , Heather Clark  3
Affiliations

Comorbidity and Severity in Childhood Apraxia of Speech: A Retrospective Chart Review

Karen V Chenausky et al. J Speech Lang Hear Res. .

Erratum in

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate comorbidity prevalence and patterns in childhood apraxia of speech (CAS) and their relationship to severity.

Method: In this retroactive cross-sectional study, medical records for 375 children with CAS (M age = 4;9 [years;months], SD = 2;9) were examined for comorbid conditions. The total number of comorbid conditions and the number of communication-related comorbidities were regressed on CAS severity as rated by speech-language pathologists during diagnosis. The relationship between CAS severity and the presence of four common comorbid conditions was also examined using ordinal or multinomial regressions.

Results: Overall, 83 children were classified with mild CAS; 35, with moderate CAS; and 257, with severe CAS. Only one child had no comorbidities. The average number of comorbid conditions was 8.4 (SD = 3.4), and the average number of communication-related comorbidities was 5.6 (SD = 2.2). Over 95% of children had comorbid expressive language impairment. Children with comorbid intellectual disability (78.1%), receptive language impairment (72.5%), and nonspeech apraxia (37.3%; including limb, nonspeech oromotor, and oculomotor apraxia) were significantly more likely to have severe CAS than children without these comorbidities. However, children with comorbid autism spectrum disorder (33.6%) were no more likely to have severe CAS than children without autism.

Conclusions: Comorbidity appears to be the rule, rather than the exception, for children with CAS. Comorbid intellectual disability, receptive language impairment, and nonspeech apraxia confer additional risk for more severe forms of CAS. Findings are limited by being from a convenience sample of participants but inform future models of comorbidity.

Supplemental material: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.22096622.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Bar chart of communication-related comorbid conditions by prevalence. Non-communication-related categories were vision-related, cardiac-related, and other (non-communication-related).
Figure 2.
Figure 2.
Number of comorbid conditions by severity category. Circles represent outlying values (3rd quartile plus 1.5 times the interquartile range). *p = .012 between severe and moderate, **p = .001 between severe and mild.
Figure 3.
Figure 3.
Number of communication-related comorbid conditions by severity category. Circles represent outlying values (3rd quartile plus 1.5 times the interquartile range). *p = .012 between severe and moderate, **p < .0005 between severe and mild.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Similar articles

See all similar articles

Cited by

References

    1. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. (2007). Childhood apraxia of speech [Technical report] . https://www.asha.org/policy/TR2007-00278/
    1. Baylis, A. L. , & Shriberg, L. D. (2019). Estimates of the prevalence of speech and motor speech disorders in youth with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 28(1), 53–82. https://doi.org/10.1044/2018_AJSLP-18-0037 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Bornman, J. , Alant, E. , & Melring, E. (2001). The use of a digital voice output device to facilitate language development in a child with developmental apraxia of speech: A case study. Disability and Rehabilitation, 23(14), 623–634. https://doi.org/10.1080/09638280110036517 - PubMed
    1. Casanova, E. L. , Gerstner, Z. , Sharp, J. L. , Casanova, M. F. , & Feltus, F. A. (2018). Widespread genotype-phenotype correlations in intellectual disability. Frontiers in Psychiatry, 9, 535–535. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2018.00535 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Chenausky, K. V. , Brignell, A. , Morgan, A. , Gagné, D. , Norton, A. , Tager-Flusberg, H. , Schlaug, G. , Shield, A. , & Green, J. (2020). Factor analysis of signs of childhood apraxia of speech. Journal of Communication Disorders, 87, 106033. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcomdis.2020.106033 - PMC - PubMed

Publication types