2. What are intra-oral prosthetics?
• Artificial substitutes for missing,
altered, or deformed oral structures
• Placed in vocal tract
• Primarily used to improve speech &
swallowing
3. Population
• Head & Neck Cancer
• Cleft palate
• Progressive neurologic
diseases
• Traumatic injuries
5. Role & Responsibilities of the SLP
• Determine specific needs
• Actively participate in design of
appliance
• Assess effectiveness
• Provide direction for modifications
• i.e. size, shape
• Provide follow-up treatment & monitor
• Swallowing, speech, voice,
resonance
• Teach patient about care & cleaning
7. Palatal Lift
• Designed to augment or replace
hard and soft palate tissue defects
• Aids in restoration of soft palate
functions
• Improves velopharyngeal closure
• Commonly used for dysarthria;
velopharyngeal incompetence
8.
9. Palatal Obturator
• Closes or occludes opening
caused by cleft or fistula
• Used to facilitate separation of
oral & nasal cavities for speech,
feeding, & swallowing
• hypernasality
• suckling ability in babies
• Not to be confused with palatal lift
14. Speech Bulb
• Occludes nasopharynx when the velum is
short (velopharygealindufficiency)
• Aids in velopharyngeal closure
• Contains pharyngeal section, goes behind
soft palate
• Can be combined with an obturator
15.
16. Tongue Prosthetic
• Sometimes used following total
glossectomy
• Steel clasps attach to lower teeth
• Facilitates speech & swallowing
18. Limitations of Prosthetic Devices
• Require insertion and removal
• Have to redo periodically due to
growth
• Can be lost or damaged
• May be very uncomfortable
• Compliance is often poor
• Don‟t permanently correct the
problem
• Many centers use only if surgery is
not possible
19. Assessment
• Prosthetic assessment is provided to:
• evaluate, select, and/or dispense a
prosthetic device to improve
functional communication
• including associated activities and
participation
20. Who Can Assess
• Prosthetic assessments are conducted by
appropriately credentialed and trained
SLPs
• SLPs perform assessments as members
of collaborative teams that include
• Individual
• family/caregivers
• Educators
• medical personnel
21. Why Assess?
To identify:
• underlying strengths and weaknesses
related to the use of prosthetic as it affects
communication and swallowing
• effects of prosthetic on activities such as
capacity and performance in everyday
communication and participation
• factors that serve as barriers or facilitators
for successful communication/swallowing
22. What Process Includes
• Review of status
• Case history info
• Standardized and/or
nonstandardized methods
• Follow-up services
• Cost considerations & safety
and health implications
• Dispensing practices
23. Setting of Assessment
• Clinical, educational or other natural
environment setting conducive to eliciting
a representative sample of the client's
communication using a prosthetic device.
• Identifying the influence of related factors
on functioning (activity and participation)
requires assessment data from multiple
settings.
24. Documentation of Assessment
• Results, interpretation, prognosis, and
recommendations.
• Provide a rationale for the preferred
prosthetic; a description of device;
procedures involved in the assessment of
the device; counseling provided to the
patient; and the patient„s response.
25. Prosthetic Intervention
Intervention services are
conducted to assist
individuals to understand,
use, adjust, and restore their
customized prosthetic
device.
26. Who Provides Intervention
Services?
• conducted by appropriately credentialed
and trained SLPs, possibly supported by
SLP assistants under appropriate
supervision.
• SLPs as members of interdisciplinary
teams
27. Expected Outcomes of Treatment
• Strengths & weaknesses related to
communication /swallowing
• Acquire new skills and strategies using the
device
• Aid for successful
communication/swallowing
• Provide appropriate accommodations and
train how to use them
• Improve abilities, functioning, participation,
and contextual facilitators
• May result in recommendations for
reassessment or follow-up, or referral for
other services
28. Goal(s) Associated With
Prosthetics
• Painless, efficient swallowing of secretions
• Unrestricted head movement
• Elimination or reduction of nasal emission
• Decrease respiratory effort/long breath
groups
• Increased subglottal pressures; increased
loudness
• Improved articulatory precision
• improved speech intelligibility
• normalized nasality
29. Clinical Process
Depending on assessment results,
intervention addresses the following:
• Provide info, course of intervention and
duration, effective
communication/swallowing
• Education and maintenance, info about
safety and instrument warranty
• How repair, maintain, and modify
• Intervention accomplishes objectives
• Meets the abilities, needs, and wants of
patient and who they communicates with,
considering the environment it will be used
30. Setting of Treatment
• clinical or educational settings
• other natural environments that are
selected on the basis of intervention goals
and in consideration for the social,
academic, and/or vocational activities that
are relevant to the individual.
31. sEMG
• As muscles contract, microvolt level
electrical signals are created within the
muscle that may be measured from the
surface of the body. A procedure that
measures muscle activity from the skin is
referred to as surface electromyography
(SEMG).
32. One Researcher‟s Results
• „Eighty-seven percent
(39/45) of all patients
increased their functional
oral intake of food/liquid
including 92% of stroke
patients and 80% of
head/neck cancer patients.‟
33. Cultural/Ethical Considerations
It is important to be
culturally sensitive in
assessment and
treatment of
individuals needing
dysphagia
management.
34. Things to Consider about
Diversity
• Foods to use in dysphagia
assessment and treatment
• Who is it appropriate to talk with about
therapy?
• Choosing assessments that are
culturally considerate
35. Counseling
• Counseling is important for
individuals pre and post surgery
• Being a part of society and
communicating with others is
something humans need, and the
need for prosthetics can alter this
from happening.
36. References
• American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. (2001). Roles of Speech-Language Pathologists in
Swallowing and Feeding Disorders: Technical Report [Technical Report]. Retrieved from
www.asha.org/policy. doi:10.1044/policy.TR2001-00150
• American Speech-Language-Hearing Association. (2004). Preferred Practice Patterns for the Profession of
Speech-Language Pathology [Preferred Practice Patterns]. Available from www.asha.org/policy.
• Crary, M. A., Carnaby, G. D., Groher, M. E., &Helseth, E. (2004). Functional benefits of dysphagia therapy
using adjunctive sEMG biofeedback [Abstract]. Dysphagia, 19, 160-164.doi:10.1007/s00455-004-
0003-8
• Grames, L.M., Jones, D.L., Kummer, A.W., Kurnell, M.P., Ruscello, D. (2006). Response to “Velopharyngeal
dysfunction:Speech characteristics, variable etiologies, evaluation techniques, and differential
treatments” by Dworkin, Marunick, &Krouse . Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools.
36, 236-238.
• Light. J. (1995). A review of oral and oropharyngeal prosthesis to faciliatate speech and swallowing. American
Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 4, 15-21.
• Likes, C. P., McCarthy, E. S., Zwilling, C., Dingman, C. A coordinated, multidisciplinary approach tocaring for
the patient with head and neck cancer [PPT document]. Retrieved from South Carolina Speech
Language Hearing Association Web site: http://www.scsha.com/handouts/session42.pdf
Notas do Editor
Maxillofacial prosthetics is a sub-specialty or often called as super-specialty of prosthodontics. All Maxillofacial Prosthodontists are prosthodontists first and then attain a fellowship training (1 year) exclusively in Maxillofacial Prosthetics.[14] Maxillofacial prosthodontists treat patients who have acquired and congenital defects of the head and neck (maxillofacial) region due to cancer, surgery, trauma, and/or birth defects. Maxillary obturators, Speech-aid prosthesis (formerly called as Pharyngeal/Soft Palate Obturators) and Mandibular-Resection prostheses are the most common prostheses planned and fabricated by Maxillofacial Prosthodontists.[14] Other types of prostheses include artificial eyes, nose and other facial prostheses fabricated in conjunction with an anaplastologist.[15]Treatment is multidisciplinary involving oral and maxillofacial surgeons, plastic surgeons, head and neck surgeons, ENT doctors, oncologists, speech therapists, occupational therapists, physiotherapists, and other healthcare professionals.
It is the role of the speech-language pathologist to determine the specific aspects of speech and swallowing that may best be facilitated by a prosthesis and to actively participate in designing an appliance that best fulfills the intended objectives. The speech-language pathologist assesses the effectiveness of the appliance for speech and swallowing functions and provides direction for modifications in prosthesis size, shape, or other design characteristics that may result in further speech and swallowing improvement. Following construction and fitting of the prosthesis, the speech-language pathologist provides treatment to help the patient reach optimum levels of speech and swallowing function.
Palatal LiftTo raise the velum when velar mobility is poorUsed for velopharyngeal incompetence, as in dysarthria
short-term prosthetics used to close defects of the hard/soft palate that may affect speech production or cause nasal regurgitation during feeding. Following surgery, there may remain a residual oronasal opening on the palate, alveolar ridge, or labial vestibule. A palatal obturator may be used to compensate for hypernasality and to aid in speech therapy targeting correction of compensatory articulation caused by the cleft palate. In simpler terms, a palatal obturator covers any fistulas (or "holes") in the roof of the mouth that lead to the nasal cavity, providing the wearer with a plastic/acrylic, removable roof of the mouth, which aids in speech, eating, and proper air flow.Palatal obturators are not to be confused with palatal lifts or other prosthetic devices. A palatal obturator may be used in cases of a deficiency in tissue, when a remaining opening in the palate occurs. In some cases it may be downsized gradually so that tissue can strengthen over time and compensate for the decreasing size of the obturator. The palatal lift however, is used when there is not enough palatal movement. It raises the palate and reduces the range of movement necessary to provide adequate closure to separate the nasal cavity from the oral cavity. Speech bulbs and palatal lifts aid in velopharyngeal closure and do not obturate a fistula. A speech bulb, yet another type of prosthetic device often confused with a palatal obturator, contains a pharyngeal section, which goes behind the soft palate.Palatal obturators are needed by individuals with cleft palate, those who have had tumors removed or have had traumatic injuries to their palate.
A modification obturator may be used in the short-term to block a palatal fistula, for augmentation of the seal and to separate the oral and nasal cavities. An interim palatal obturator is used post-palatal surgery. This obturator aids in closing the remaining fistula and is used when no further surgical procedures are planned. It must be frequently revised. A definitive obturator is used when further rehabilitation is not possible for the patient and is intended for long-term use
A typical prosthetic tongue for speech is flat with wide anterior elevation, which aids in articulation of anterior lingual alveolar sounds (eg, /t/, /d/). The typical prosthetic tongue also has a posterior elevation, which aids in production of posterior lingual alveolar sounds (eg, /k/, /g/) and helps shape the oral cavity for improved vowel productions The tongue prosthesis for swallowing is made with a trough in its posterior slope to guide the food bolus into the oropharynx. A speech pathologist and, when necessary, a nutritionist should monitor all patients who have a glossectomy.