Abstract
I present here, a case of speech disorder associated with neurogenic muscular atrophy and discuss the treatment. A 55-year-old female who complained of speech difficulty was referred to my speech clinic from the First Department of Internal Medicine in October 1982. The soft palate did not show an abnormal form but the mobility was very poor. Nasal emission was distinctly recognized and speech showed hypernasality. The speech pathological diagnosis was speech disorder with acquired velopharungeal closure incompetency and the use of a palatal lift prosthesis (PLP) was indicated. As the nasality did not disappeared by internal medicine, a PLP was made in November 1982. The patient began to wear the PLP in January 1983 and the nasality subsequently disappeared. Sound spectrography at pronouncing /p/ showed spike fill as the normal pattern. The PLP had been removed by the patient when she visited the clinic 9 months later. The speech after removal was evaluated by the speech test, sound spectrography and flow-nasalitygraphy. The results showed normal speech. I described here, a case of neurogenic muscular atrophy that showed nasality and was treated with a PLP. The PLP was removed after the patient acquired normal speech.
