Blog Archives
Managing change in the care of children with complex needs: healthcare providers’ perspectives
Conclusion. Findings support the adoption of integrated partnership working, going beyond the identification of key professionals, to developing a set of criteria against which future service provision could be judged. Research priorities were identified; comparative evaluation of services, better understanding of the transition process and a clearer sense of the individual’s response to the increasing customization of services.
from the Journal of Advanced Nursing
Cochrane Review: Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) for autism spectrum disorders (ASD)
Authors’ conclusions
There is no evidence of effect of SSRIs in children and emerging evidence of harm. There is limited evidence of the effectiveness of SSRIs in adults from small studies in which risk of bias is unclear.
Auditory processing and combination of distinctive features in speech acquisition in children with phonological disorders
CONCLUSION: The results obtained in the SSW and Dichotic Listening Test showed a deficit in the abilities of complex temporal order and figure-ground, as well as lagged sensorial memory. These deficits might jeopardize the acquisition of the features described.
Clinical and instrumental swallowing evaluation in children with cerebral palsy
CONCLUSION: Clinical and instrumental evaluations of swallowing are complementary and essential in the diagnosis of oropharyngeal dysphagia in children with cerebral palsy.
Expressive vocabulary and phonological awareness: correlations in children with phonological disorders
CONCLUSION: A correlation was found between some phonological awareness abilities and the expressive vocabulary of the children with phonological disorder in this study, in different ages. Performance in both tasks improved with age.
Longitudinal pragmatic profile of a child with auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder
Human communication depends mostly on the conversion of ideas into language, involving the interaction among all its components – phonological, semantic, syntactic and pragmatic. Pragmatics studies the relationship between the social meaning of language and its semantic content, expressed by the communicative act itself. Auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder generates a dyssynchrony in nerve conduction, contributing to an impairment in speech perception. In hearing impaired children the language acquisition and development process can be stimulated with intervention. The aim of this study was to present a longitudinal follow-up of the use of pragmatic communication abilities by a child with auditory neuropathy spectrum disorder. The child received speech-language pathology therapy during three years in the Educational Audiology area. Video recordings of spontaneous conversation were made in the beginning of each year. These recordings were transcribed and analyzed according to the verbal communicative abilities protocol. In the initial recording, the most frequent ability presented by the child was the direct response; however these were extended to more complex responses during the intervention. In the last recording the child proposes new topics of discourse, produce narratives and arguments. The emergence of more sophisticated communication skills is justified by the language development, which benefits from language therapy with hearing impaired children. This suggests that, for the case study described, speech-language pathology therapy contributed to the improvement of pragmatic communication abilities.
External validation of the LittlEARS® Auditory Questionnaire with English-speaking families of Canadian children with normal hearing
To examine the external validity of the United Kingdom English version of the LittlEARS® Auditory Questionnaire with English-speaking families of Canadian children with normal hearing.
from the International Journal of Pediatric Otorhinolaryngology
Intervening factors in language therapy with autistic children
Recent studies state that the incidence of autism spectrum disorders is 1% of the infantile population. It implies the need of urgent identification of efficient intervention proposals as well as of the factors that may intervene in these processes. The aim of this study is to describe three years of language therapy processes of three children diagnosed within the autism spectrum with different developmental characteristics and different responses to the therapeutic process. All the children were attending a specialized ambulatory program once a week. The language therapists were post-graduate students in the field and the therapeutic intervention started approximately six months prior to the beginning of the study. The children presented evidence of the diversity of the autism phenotype. Although it was not the purpose of this study, the reference to the three different features of the autism spectrum is clear. This way, the intervention processes received subtle adjustments to each child’s specific needs and possibilities. All children had significant progress in their manifestations. The longitudinal individual analysis of therapeutic intervention processes allows the identification of associate process that might be determinant to the results and that demand consistent approaches.
Investigating child raising attitudes of fathers having or not having a child with hearing loss
It is very important that the father’s having enough information and support help the father to be encouraged and feel himself enough for this issue. Moreover, the wrong attitudes and behaviors towards the child can be corrected upon noticing them.
from the International Journal of Pediatric Otorhinolaryngology
Cochrane review: Interventions for acute otitis externa
Patients prescribed antibiotic/steroid drops can expect their symptoms to last for approximately six days after treatment has begun. Although patients are usually treated with topical medication for seven to 10 days it is apparent that this will undertreat some patients and overtreat others. It may be more useful when prescribing ear drops to instruct patients to use them for at least a week. If they have symptoms beyond the first week they should continue the drops until their symptoms resolve (and possibly for a few days after), for a maximum of a further seven days. Patients with persisting symptoms beyond two weeks should be considered treatment failures and alternative management initiated.
A new measurement tool for speech development based on Ling’s stages of speech acquisition in pediatric cochlear implant recipients
Conclusions
The K-Ling was a valid evaluation tool regarding speech development in young children who are using CI and who are in the early stages of speech development. Longitudinal assessments of phonetic and phonologic developments may be attainable in young children using the K-Ling.
from the International Journal of Pediatric Otorhinolaryngology
Working memory influences processing speed and reading fluency in ADHD
Processing-speed deficits affect reading efficiency, even among individuals who recognize and decode words accurately. Children with ADHD who decode words accurately can still have inefficient reading fluency, leading to a bottleneck in other cognitive processes. This “slowing” in ADHD is associated with deficits in fundamental components of executive function underlying processing speed, including response selection. The purpose of the present study was to deconstruct processing speed in order to determine which components of executive control best explain the “processing” speed deficits related to reading fluency in ADHD. Participants (41 ADHD, 21 controls), ages 9-14 years, screened for language disorders, word reading deficits, and psychiatric disorders, were administered measures of copying speed, processing speed, reading fluency, working memory, reaction time, inhibition, and auditory attention span. Compared to controls, children with ADHD showed reduced oral and silent reading fluency and reduced processing speed—driven primarily by deficits on WISC-IV Coding. In contrast, groups did not differ on copying speed. After controlling for copying speed, sex, severity of ADHD-related symptomatology, and GAI, slowed “processing” speed (i.e., Coding) was significantly associated with verbal span and measures of working memory but not with measures of response control/inhibition, lexical retrieval speed, reaction time, or intrasubject variability. Further, “processing” speed (i.e., Coding, residualized for copying speed) and working memory were significant predictors of oral reading fluency. Abnormalities in working memory and response selection (which are frontally mediated and enter into the output side of processing speed) may play an important role in deficits in reading fluency in ADHD, potentially more than posteriorally mediated problems with orienting of attention or perceiving the stimulus.
Bone-anchored hearing aids in children and young adults: the Freeman Hospital experience
Conclusion: The use of bone-anchored hearing aids and Softband results in significant improvements in quality of life for children and young adults with hearing impairment. There is significant under-utilisation of bone-anchored hearing aids in children with skull and congenital abnormalities, and we would advocate bone-anchored hearing aid implantation for these patients.
from the Journal of Laryngology and Otology
(Central) auditory processing disorders in individuals with and without dyslexia
CONCLUSION: subjects from the dyslexic group presented different patterns of (central) auditory processing disorder, with greater alteration in the tests that evaluate the temporal processing when compared to the tests that evaluate other auditory abilities.
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