[Summer school speech therapy for children with cleft palate and language disorder]

Cleft palate patients with language impairment require specific therapy.

Study two modalities of speech intervention in cleft palate children with associated linguistic impairment, a conventional approach providing speech therapy, twice a week, and a speech summer camp for a period of three weeks.

Twenty-five cleft palate patients with language impairment were studied. A matched control group was gathered. Patients included in the first group attended a three week duration speech summer camp. Control patients included in the second group received speech therapy twice a week.

At the onset of either the summer camp or the speech intervention period, the severity of language impairment was evenly distributed with non-significant differences across groups (p > 0.05). After the summer camp or 9 months of speech therapy sessions, both groups showed a significant decrease in the severity of language impairment (p < 0.05). At the end of the summer camp, and the therapy period, non-significant differences, were found between groups (p > 0.05).

Speech summer camp is a reliable and efficient method to provide speech therapy for left palate patients with language impairment.