The Effectiveness of Rapid Syllable Transition Treatment in Improving Communication in Children with Cerebral Palsy: A Randomized Controlled Trial

Abstract

Cerebral palsy (CP) is a movement disorder and majority of children with CP have communication impairments which impact participation with this population. Rapid Syllable Transition Treatment (ReST) is a motor speech intervention primarily for children with Childhood Apraxia of Speech (CAS). A recent pilot study in which ReST was trialed with children with CP showed improved speech performance. Therefore, a single blind randomized controlled trial to compare ReST to usual care with 14 children with moderate-to-severe CP and dysarthria was conducted. ReST was provided on telehealth. ANCOVA with 95% confidence intervals indicated significant group differences in favor of ReST in speech accuracy (F = 5.1, p =.001), intelligibility (F = 2.8, p =.02) and communicative participation on both the FOCUS (F = 2, p =.02) and Intelligibility in Context Scale (F = 2.4, p =.04). ReST was found to be more effective than usual care.