Living with dysarthria: evaluation of a self-report questionnaire

The study describes an effort to evaluate the speech difficulties as perceived by individuals with dysarthria. A self-report questionnaire, Living with Neurologically Based Speech Difficulties (Living with Dysarthria), was answered by 55 individuals with varying types and degrees of dysarthria. Results show that both type and degree of subjectively perceived communicative difficulties varied. Degree of communicative difficulties was not related to age, gender, diagnosis, disease duration or employment status in this group. Generally, the overriding problems were related to restrictions in communicative participation, possibilities to actively take part in work and studies and to express one's personality were particularly affected. Communication was also affected by emotions and by the number and familiarity of people present in communicative encounters. The dominating speech difficulties were related to reduced speech rate and a need for repetition as a consequence of misunderstandings. A statistically nonsignificant difference was found between the higher mean of the group with moderate dysarthria compared to the groups with severe and mild dysarthria, indicating that severity of dysarthria does not necessarily predict extent of perceived communicative difficulties. It is concluded that systematic subjective reports should always be included in the assessment of individuals with acquired dysarthria.