The assessment of lipreading ability: some practical considerations in the use of the tracking procedure

Continuous discourse tracking is potentially a very useful clinical technique and the practical difficulties it may present to the inexperienced user can readily be overcome. Some modifications to the traditional scoring procedure are described to provide a measure of fluency in addition to the basic word per minute score. Suggestions are offered regarding the practical management of the timing and the choice and preparation of the text. The procedure is discussed in the context of evaluating different augmentative approaches to lipreading for individual patients.