Assessment of speech in early-onset ataxia: a pilot study.

Aim: The aim of the study was to determine whether paediatric ataxia speech subscores are reliably applicable for international early-onset ataxia (EOA) databases. If so, we reasoned that ataxia speech subscores should be associated with ataxia scores and involve high interobserver agreement, including those for internationally applicable Scale for Assessment and Rating of Ataxia (SARA) syllable repetition tasks (SARASRT).

Method: Three independent paediatric neurologists and a speech therapist scored speech in 52 healthy children (mean age 10y, range 4-16y) and 40 individuals with EOA (mean age 15y, range 5-34y).

The discrepancy hypothesis in children with language disorders: does it work?

Objectives: Analysis of the relationship between verbal and nonverbal development in children with language problems.

Methods: From 134 children enrolled in a multidisciplinary diagnostic procedure in a speech and hearing clinic and diagnosed as having a language disorder, the language comprehension score (LCQ) and the nonverbal IQ score (SON-IQ) were compared. t-Tests were used to test whether the children's mean LCQ differs from their mean SON-IQ and to test whether the children with an inadequate LCQ differ from children with an adequate LCQ with respect to discrepancy.