The class was instructed to review an article from a healthcare journal and write about the facts on the article and our thoughts about Healthcare journals and how they can help our future profession.
1. Running head: JOURNAL ARTICLE REVIEW 1
Healthcare Journal Article Review
Brittany Clark
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for HLST 2001
University of Louisiana at Monroe
Monroe, Louisiana
Dr. Jessica Roy Dolecheck, MA, LOTR
Professor
February 14, 2014
2. Running head: JOURNAL ARTICLE REVIEW 2
The section in the brain called the Broca’s area is highly associated with speech. When
this area of the brain is damaged, the individual may lose the ability to express their speech. In
other words, someone with Broca’s aphasia is able to comprehend and understand speech and
language, but have trouble speaking or expressing their thoughts through speech. Because of this,
their utterances may be short, simple and delayed (Seikel, King, & Drumwright 2010).
Individuals with damage to the Broca’s area rarely achieve improvement. However, one way to
get the patient to speak fluently is by speech entrainment, which speech pathologists can
administer.
This article is named “Speech Entrainment Enables Patients with Broca’s Aphasia to
Produce Fluent Speech.” The first experiment in this article was to observe patients with Broca’s
aphasia and the effects that occuR during speech entrainment, mostly focusing on the number of
words subjects could produce. This experiment included thirteen people that had all been
diagnosed with Broca’s aphasia. They were each asked to copy a speaker in “real-time” that they
could see and hear on an iPod under three different circumstances: (1) speech entrainment while
the speaker is seen on the screen and heard on the headphones; (2) speech entrainment where the
speaker is heard through headphones, but not seen; and (3) the participants spoke regularly as
they would in conversation. This study found that the patients had increased speech output by >2
when mimicking the audio and visual entrainment (PMC, 2012). However, when tested with the
audio only circumstance and the spontaneous speaking, there was no improvement. From this
information it could be hypothesized that the sight of the speaker speaking the words is needed
for the best improvement in patients with Broca’s aphasia (PMC, 2012). The improvement that
the audio-visual speech entrainment had on these patients included better fluency while
speaking. The participants also showed that they had a greater variety of words during speech
3. PEER REVIEW JOURNAL 3
entrainment. (PMC, 2012). According to this article, the results of this experiment suggest that
“training with speech entrainment improves speech production in Broca’s aphasia by providing a
therapeutic method for a disorder that has been shown to be particularly resistant to treatment.”
This study concludes that speech entrainment with sight and audio can be used to help Broca’s
aphasia patient have a greater speech output not only while mimicking the speaker, but also
afterwards in their everyday life (PMC, 2012).
Speech pathologists work with individuals who have trouble with everyday speech. Since
Broca’s aphasia causes speech problems, Broca’s aphasia patients may work closely with a
speech pathologist. Speech pathologists can use the information in this article to help them work
with clients who suffer from Broca’s aphasia. The method of speech entrainment, as stated in
this article, was beneficial to the participants if it was audible and visually stimulating. This
study showed improvement of the client’s expressive vocabulary and the fluency of their speech.
Using the information from the experiment in this article, the speech pathologist can perform the
treatment of having the client with Broca’s aphasia repeat a speaker that they can see and hear in
order to help them communicate with less difficulty.
In conclusion, healthcare peer reviewed journals can help certain professions. Using these
journals, professionals can research methods that are beneficial to their client’s condition or
simply gain knowledge about a work related topic. They provide experiments and their results
which can aid others in new research and let others draw their own conclusions. Speech
pathologist need to take advantage of these resources for their client’s benefit. Using these
journals can give speech pathologist the most recent information they need when dealing with
individuals who have different speech disorders, especially when the patient has a disorder that is
previously known to have no treatment.
5. PEER REVIEW JOURNAL 5
References
PMC (2012). Speech entrainment enables patients with Broca's aphasia to produce fluent
speech. Oxford Journals. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1093%2Fbrain%2Faws301
Seikel, J. A., King, D. W., & Drumright, D. G. (2010). Anatomy & physiology for speech,
language, and hearing. Australia: Thomson Delmar Learning.