Parkinson’s Disease: Speech Disorder and Released Infantile Oroneuromotor Activity

Abstract

Thirty subjects with primary Parkinson’s disease, each of whom was classified as being in one of three stages of disease progression, were examined for the presence of infantile oroneuromotor activity and evaluated for severity of speech disorder. It was expected that greater speech defectiveness and an increased incidence and strength of infantile oroneuromotor symptoms would accompany each stage of disease progression. Although severity of speech disorder and presence of infantile oroneuromotor symptomatology did not parallel the various stages of disease progression, the results of this study indicate that in the most severe stage of parkinsonian progression, subjects were more severely impaired in speech ability, and more subjects evidenced infantile oroneuromotor symptomatology. Since infantile oral reflexology was tested independently of speech, it is not known if these patterns become released during the act of speaking: it could not be determined whether any released activity occurred intraorally, and observation of each of the subjects during the act of speaking did not reveal infantile oroneuromotor patterns akin to those which have been reported in the literature in relation to cerebral palsied individuals.