Grant to help Yeshiva University students offer SPEAK OUT! therapy
Speech-language grad students to be certified in Parkinson's vocal program
The Parkinson Voice Project (PVP) has awarded a specialized training grant to the speech-language pathology program at Yeshiva University in New York that will enable graduate students to offer virtual SPEAK OUT! voice therapy to people living with Parkinson’s disease.
SPEAK OUT! is a research-backed therapy program from PVP that coaches people to be conscious and deliberate about their speech — to “speak with intent,” per the nonprofit. It aims to ease common Parkinson’s motor symptoms such as low volume, slurred speech, and difficulty swallowing.
The training grant will certify speech-language graduate students so they can provide free SPEAK OUT! therapy to patients in New York through Yeshiva’s Katz School Virtual Clinic, according to a university news story.
“This is incredibly specialized training — something that typically only comes post-professionally. … To offer it to graduate students is rare, and to offer it to patients for free will be transformative,” said Katie Threlkeld, a clinical assistant professor at Yeshiva and a coordinator of the virtual clinic, who helped secure the grant.
SPEAK OUT! therapy designed to ease Parkinson’s vocal symptoms
A progressive disease, Parkinson’s is caused by degeneration in brain cells that are involved in motor control. This can lead to muscle weakness and a variety of symptoms, including tremor and shuffling gait.
The same muscle weakness also causes difficulties with speech and swallowing for many people with Parkinson’s.
“The muscles that control the mouth and voice make smaller, less forceful movements,” Threlkeld said. “That’s why we get reduced vocal volume and slurred speech.”
PVP designed SPEAK OUT! to help Parkinson’s patients regain control of these muscles, and thus their speech and swallowing abilities. Intentionally engaging the mouth and throat muscles can help retrain the brain to control movement using cells that have not been damaged by the disease, according to PVP.
The program has been shown to enable many therapy participants to build the pathways they need to speak loudly and clearly in regular conversation, per a PVP webpage.
This allows our students to approach a diagnosis like Parkinson’s with confidence and compassion. … They’re learning not only the theory, but how to apply it through clinical interventions — often before they even begin their adult externships.
Key, per Threlkeld, is getting patients to use the techniques outside of the clinic.
“The goal is always generalization,” Threlkeld said. “We want patients to speak this way in their homes, in restaurants, with their grandchildren—not just in the therapy room.”
The program involves online speech therapy sessions, both individually and in a group, as well as education and daily practice at home. PVP has funded SPEAK OUT! programs at universities and research centers across the country.
Yeshiva University’s training grant will allow Katz School students to complete the 10.5-hour training and deliver the program to patients at their virtual clinic and in clinical placements around the country. To date, 13 students have completed the training, which typically is offered to licensed professionals.
“This allows our students to approach a diagnosis like Parkinson’s with confidence and compassion,” Threlkeld said. “They’re learning not only the theory, but how to apply it through clinical interventions — often before they even begin their adult externships.”
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