A comparative study of the speech respiratory characteristics of 7-15 years old ordinary children and children with spastic cerebral palsy

Abstract

Objective To explore the speech respiratory characteristics of 7-15 years old children with spastic cerebral palsy and the differences between ordinary children and children with cerebral palsy.Methods The maximum phonation time (MPT) and maximum counting ability (MCA) of 90 ordinary children and 58 children with cerebral palsy aged 7-15 years were measured and a comparison between the 2 groups were conducted.Results (1) Age has significant effects on MPT and MCA of the ordinary children (P ＜0.05).The MPT and MCA of the ordinary children at the age of 7 ～9 years and 10 ～ 12 years are lower than the ones at the age of 13 ～ 15 years.Age has almost no effects on MPT and MCA of children with cerebral palsy(P ＞0.05) ; (2)Sex has no significant effects on MPT and MCA of ordinary children and children with cerebral palsy (P ＞0.05) ; (3) The MPT and MCA of children with cerebral palsy are significantly lower than those of ordinary children (P ＜0.05).Conclusions The MPT and MCA of ordinary children are increased with the growth of age,especially after the age of 13 years,but the children with spastic cerebral palsy do not show that kind of trend and demonstrate a state of retardation of speech respiratory function.Compared with ordinary children,the children with spastic cerebral palsy are easier to suffer from insufficient respiratory support and poor respiratory-phonatory coordination. Key words: Spastic children with cerebral palsy; The speech respiratory characteristics; Maximum ponation time; Maximum counting ability