Speech Therapy
What is speech therapy?
Speech therapy is treatment that improves your ability to talk and use other language skills. It helps you express your thoughts and understand what other people are saying to you. It can also improve skills like your memory and ability to solve problems.
You’ll work with a speech-language pathologist (SLP, or speech therapist) to find exercises and treatments that address your specific needs. Some people need help talking and communicating. Others need speech therapy to process and understand language better.
Speech therapy can help you improve your:
- Early language skills (especially children learning to talk and communicate).
- Ability to use your voice.
- Language comprehension (how well you understand words and language).
- Fluency (how well and how comfortably you can use language).
- Clarity and expression (how easily you can communicate what you want to).
Speech therapy can help you improve your:
Speech therapy will help you improve your ability to speak and communicate with language. What kind of speech therapy you need depends on several factors, including your age and which health condition or speech challenges you might have.
Your speech-language pathologist will recommend appropriate treatment based on your specific situation. There are many different approaches and categories of speech therapy, and your speech therapist will find one that works best for you.
What are the advantages of speech therapy?
Speech therapy offers a number of benefits, including:
- Improved self-esteem.
- Increased independence.
- Improved ability to comprehend and express ideas, thoughts and feelings.
- School readiness for young children.
- Enhanced vocal quality.
- Early language skills.
- Better swallowing function.
- Improved quality of life.
We are Providing:
Voice Therapy
What is voice therapy?
Voice therapy helps people with voice disorders change vocal behaviors and heal their vocal cords. The therapy helps your voice sound stronger and more like it did before the voice disorder.
Voice therapy can also help prevent a voice disorder. And people who are transgender may benefit from a type of voice therapy called gender-affirming voice therapy.
What are voice disorders?
Voice disorders affect your voice box (larynx), and can cause a consistent or inconsistent change in your voice. The larynx is the area of your throat that contains your vocal cords. It also has the muscles you need to talk, breathe and swallow.
Voice disorders can change the quality, pitch or loudness of your voice. Your voice may sound strained, husky or weak. Sometimes, your voice becomes a whisper or disappears altogether.
How does your voice work?
When you make sounds, air moves through your lungs and into your windpipe (trachea) and voice box. Inside of your larynx are two vocal cords (also called vocal folds). These flexible muscles vibrate as air passes through them. The vibrations produce the sound waves that are your voice.
Typically, your vocal cords vibrate together to produce a clear sound. Vocal disorders occur when your vocal cords vibrate out of synch or don’t fully open or close.
Pitch refers to how high or low your voice is. The size and the length (tension) of your vocal folds affect pitch.
Who needs voice therapy?
Close to 18 million Americans have problems with their voice, but many don’t seek treatment. Voice therapy helps children and adults. Your healthcare provider may recommend voice therapy if you have a voice disorder, such as:
Laryngitis: Allergies or an upper respiratory infection irritate your voice box, causing it to swell. Laryngitis typically improves when the underlying condition clears up.
Muscle tension dysphonia: Excess stress on your vocal cords causes your muscles to tighten.
Spasmodic dysphonia/vocal tremor: Voice box muscles spasm or shake, causing periodic breaks in speech. Spasmodic dysphonia is a neurological disorder.
Vocal cord dysfunction (VCD): Vocal cords want to shut when they should be open. Vocal cord dysfunction can lead to trouble breathing during exercise or when your throat is irritated.
Vocal cord lesions: Benign (noncancerous) growths form on vocal cords, affecting your voice. Types of vocal cord lesions include nodules, polyps and cysts. Singers and people who speak a lot, such as teachers and attorneys, are more prone to vocal cord lesions.
Vocal cord paralysis: One or both vocal folds have no movement or reduced movement, which you can’t control. This is due to scar or nerve damage. Vocal cord paralysis can cause hoarseness, difficulty swallowing (dysphagia) and shortness of breath (dyspnea).
What are voice therapy techniques?
During voice therapy, your healthcare provider teaches you exercises that improve vocal function. The exercises may vary depending on the cause of your vocal problem. They may include:
- Breathing exercises to help control your diaphragm muscle that enables you to breathe and speak.
- Tension release exercises to decrease the tension in your throat, such as stretching and massage.
- Semi-occluded vocal tract sounds such as straw phonation, lip trills, humming and more to promote healthy vocal cord vibration.
- Voice building exercises to strengthen vocal cords and breath support for those with weak vocal cords.
What are the advantages of voice therapy?
As a preventive measure, voice therapy can help you learn healthy ways to use your vocal cords. Therapy helps prevent problems like hoarseness, laryngitis and lesions that commonly affect singers and people who speak a lot in their jobs. Voice therapy can also help heal vocal cord swelling and small vocal cord lesions by promoting better vocal cord vibration. It’s also used to help vocal cords heal after surgery. There aren’t any downsides or risks to participating in voice therapy.