Description
A tongue cancer survivor says speech therapy helped her regain her confidence so she could join her family to eat at a restaurant again. Karen Liesching-Schroder sought medical help in 2015 when what she thought was an ulcer became excruciatingly painful. He was surprised to learn that he had cancer the following year because he was a healthy and fit person who had never smoked and drank very little alcohol. She linked mouth cancers to older men who smoked and drank.
The nursery nurse at the school, in Rochford, Essex, said a speech therapist helped her regain her confidence after the operation.
"Amelia helped me find strategies to deal with my problems swallowing and eating in public," Karen told the PA news agency.
“He also helped me with exercises to strengthen and straighten my tongue; some of them mechanically impossible and others that, with time, practice and perseverance, gave results.
"We also worked on a food diary where I had to try different foods and report back."
Karen said it was "a boost" to see how much she had improved when she repeated a survey completed during her first assessment: "Amelia helped me with my speech, my eating and my confidence and it was because of her that I was able to start eating again." new with my family
When Karen suffered the late effects of radiation therapy and severe nerve pain in the area of her tongue that had been removed last year, she stopped doing speech therapy exercises to make daily life a little easier and control pain.
"He was harder to understand and had trust issues," he told PA, but found it helpful to use Makaton, which uses symbols, signs and speech to communicate.
"I started introducing Makaton to my family at home so they could understand me more easily. I taught them the alphabet signs for sounds I couldn't make and basic signs to help us. I also bought Makaton in my class, which has helped me and children with speech and language problems.
Karen currently works with highly specialized speech therapist Richard Cave, whom she met through the Mouth Cancer Foundation, for which she is a patient ambassador and runs a support group page.
Mr. Cave, who is also an adviser to the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, published an article about the Android voice app Project Relate, which aims to help people with non-standard speech communicate more easily with others.
"I was excited because I thought it would be perfect for people like me who have speech problems," Karen said.
“Once I installed the app and started recording voice cards for the phone to recognize my voice, I got more excited.
"Richard wanted to reach more people, so I posted it to encourage more oral cancer patients to come and try it, because it's a free app.
“As a speech therapist, Richard recognized many of the barriers patients like me face when we walk into a coffee shop and try to order a cappuccino or into a restaurant and order a vegetarian lasagna.
“When we can't pronounce those important sounds, at least with a voice app trained to understand all our mechanical difficulties with sounds, the voice app can help us.
"This app is going to be very important for people like me.
"I wouldn't have known this if it wasn't for speech therapists like Richard who wanted to make our lives better."
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