The impact of feeding and swallowing disorders on language development

The development of orofacial structures important for feeding, swallowing and speech begins and ends in the prenatal period. The feeding, swallowing ability and the ability to speak then develop further in the infant period and early childhood. In the theoretical part of the master’s thesis we firstly described the development of feeding, swallowing and the process of swallowing. Then we specified possible feeding and swallowing disorders in children, their prevalence, signs and symptoms, we described the assessment and rehabilitation of those disorders. We described speech development and specifically exposed factors that affect it. Regarding speech disorders we specifically paid attention to voice disorders and articulation disorders. We specified developmental milestones for feeding, swallowing and speech, and then stated reflexes that are important for those processes. All that information is crucial for better understanding feeding, swallowing and speech disorders. At the end of theoretical part, we described known data on the connection between speech and feeding, swallowing. We also described which muscles and nerves participate in both processes, how those two connect and wrote down research findings on the topic. The aim of the empirical part was firstly to establish the prevalence of feeding and swallowing disorders in the population of typically developing children and then to compare speech development of children with and without feeding and swallowing disorders. With this purpose we created a questionnaire for parents about possible feeding, swallowing, speech development, voice and articulation problems of their child and a protocol of the assessment of the child’s speech abilities (orofacial area motoric skills, voice, articulation) based on the review of literature. The questionnaire was given to 120 parents of children aged between 4.0 and 6.0 years. The questionnaire also contained consensus for an examination of child’s speech ability. 60 parents filled out the questionnaire and gave their written consent for the examination of their children. This was also our final research sample. The results showed that 23.3 % of children had or still have feeding and swallowing disorders. Difficulties with sucking and chewing were the most common problems. Detected by the researcher’s subjective assessment of voice 25 % of children had voice disorders. 80 % of children that participated in the research had or still have some sort of speech disorder (delayed speech development, articulation disorders, and voice disorders). This data was gained through questionnaire and the assessment of children’s speech abilities. Articulation disorders were expectedly the most common. Orofacial area motoric skills were disturbed in 23.3 % of children. We found a statistically significant link between feeding and swallowing disorders and delayed speech development, as well as between speech disorders and age. There were no statistically significant links between other data