Acessibilidade / Reportar erro

EDITORIAL

EDITORIAL

Claudia Regina Furquim de Andrade

Professora Titular, Departamento de Fisioterapia, Fonoaudiologia e Terapia Ocupacional, Faculdade de Medicina, Universidade de São Paulo

Dear Readers:

We have reached the end of 2007, the first year that our Journal has four numbers. The year of 2007 was also a year of changes in the structure of the published articles. Today, our Journal attends with a greater scope the peculiarities of the Brazilian Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences. The multiple therapeutic possibilities have entered a new phase; that of proving its scientific pertinence and its real effectiveness. Evidence based practice is here to stay and has come so that all therapeutic procedures can be submitted to verification. The Journal Pró-Fono has this purpose, that is, to promote a responsible science.

The meeting of the international researchers, who discussed this theme, in the XV Brazilin Speech, Language and Hearing Congress (Gramado, RS, 2007) was very well timed. The paradigm that supports evidence based practice has not been sufficiently divulged. The clinical experience of the therapist does not simply grow as a consequence of his practice; it grows as a consequence of the association between the clinical decisions and the support given by external evidence - obtained in the background of researches and of manuscripts that are systematically published about a certain theme or pathology of the human communication. The key to clinical success is in the association of targets, planning and control of clinical procedures, acceptance and commitment of the client.

The adequate managing of a case is not possible without making a careful consideration of the patient's clinical data (medical, deontological, nutritional etc.), without having a clear understanding about the natural history of the disease. Also, therapeutic counseling should consider the set of values of the patient and his family. Results will not be satisfactory, nor there will be a possible prognosis, if there are no previous indicators that contemplate the goal to be achieved, the therapeutic plan to be implemented and the balance between expectations and the patient's values.

My message for the New Year is this, if what you do is good, if it deserves to be divulged, let's get to work, let's prove that the Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences work. Let's prove how, when and for whom it works.

In this Editorial we will have the words (Guest Editorials) of the President of the Brazilian Society of the Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences, Doctor Fernanda Dreux Miranda Fernandes, and of the President of the International Association of Logopedics and Phoniatrics, Doctor Mara Suzana Behlau.

This Journal, Volume 19, Number 4, is composed by eleven manuscripts, eight being Original Research Articles, one Research Letter and one Conference Report.

Cattoni et al. (2007) presents a study with the purpose of describing the postural and morphologic characteristic of the stomatognathic system of 100 mouth breathing children, according to age. The obtained results suggest that the mouth breathing children, participants of this study, presented pathologic adaptations in the postural and morphological characteristics of the stomatognathic system.

The purpose of the study presented by Silva et al. (2007) was to characterize the Long Latency Auditory Evoked Potentials (LLAEP) in 21 individuals with HIV/AIDS in comparison to a control group. The findings of this study suggest that individuals with HIV/AIDS present a disorder in the cortical regions of the auditory pathway, indicating the importance of such tests in the evaluation of these individuals.

The study presented by Lamônica & Ferraz (2007) verified the performance of eight children with spastic diplegic cerebral palsy (D-CP) regarding their psycholinguistic skills. Being D-CP frequently related to periventricular leukomalacia (PVL), the results of the study indicate that the children with D-CP and with suggestive signs of PVL presented deficits in the psycholinguistics abilities, justifying the need of additional studies in this.

A study about the relationship between Specific Language Impairment (SLI) and visual short-term memory was presented by Menezes et al. (2007). This study compared the performance of 20 SLI children to a control group of 29 children with normal language development in tasks involving visual short-term memory. According to the results, SLI children presented deficits in tasks involving visual short-term memory, which must be discussed in order to understand the nature of the disorder and also in terms of speech-language intervention.

Lucas et al. (2007) emphasize the importance of assessing the auditory processing, not only related to the diagnosis but also for therapy planning. The study proposed by the authors had as a purpose to characterize the normal score patterns in an auditory processing screening test, applied in 40 children, comparing the results to those in the national literature. The conclusion of the study points to significant statistical differences between the analyzed studies, indicating the need of other studies involving a larger number of children of different geographic and social areas.

The purpose of the research presented by Capellini et al. (2007) was to characterize and compare the phonological awareness, working memory, reading and writing abilities of individuals with dyslexia and their affected family members. The results indicate that deficits in phonological awareness, working memory, reading and writing seem to have genetic susceptibility that possibly determine, when in interaction with the environment, the manifestation of dyslexia.

The manuscript presented by Carrillo & Ortiz (2007) described the acoustic and auditory-perceptual characteristics of the voice of 42 patients with dysarthria. The results indicate that in the auditory-perceptual the most present vocal quality was the harsh and breathy voice, laryngeal-pharyngeal resonance and instability on vocal onset. In the acoustic analysis the following was observed: instability in the spectrogram, absence of the upper sub harmonics, presence of noise between the harmonics and reduced maximum phonatory time. The authors conclude the study pointing that the acoustic analysis, associated to the auditory- perceptual assessments, is of assistance in the clinical diagnosis of dysarthrias.

Andrade & Limongi (2007) present a qualitative and quantitative research with the purpose of verifying the different forms of communication in children with Down Syndrome and the effectiveness of speech-language intervention according to the dialectic-didactic method, based on the clinical method proposed by Piaget. The authors conclude that it was possible to confirm the effectiveness of the dialectic-didactic method as a therapy method, based on the language development shown by the children who were submitted to this form of therapy.

The case study of Elias et al. (2007) presented a case of a child with cerebrovascular disease (CVD), a rare condition; with short, medium and long-term characteristics that, according to the authors, deserve further investigation. Given this, the purpose of this study was to describe the audiological manifestations in a child with CVD in two distinct moments of clinical follow-up. The results indicate that clinical development, although favorable, was below the average expected for the age and that the evaluation of the child permitted the characterization of the auditory behavior, the definition of its parameters as well as the development of the audiological characteristics.

Andrade et al. (2007) opens the Section Research Letters, presenting a study that investigated the relationship between stuttering amelioration and cerebral activity using P300 event-related potentials pre and post-treatment. The results suggest that, given certain limits, differences in interhemispheric activation patterns can be measured pre and post treatment

Finally, Fernandes (2007) presents, in the Conference Report Section, a discussion about the model of education of the Brazilian Speech, Language and Hearing Science (graduation and post graduation), which was presented by the author in the 27th World Congress of the International Association of Logopedics and Phoniatrics (IALP), that happened in Denmark in the beginning of August (2007).

I leave whishing everyone a Merry Christmas and a magnificent New Year!

Regards,

Claudia

Referências Bibliográficas

  • Andrade CRF, Sassi FC, Matas CG, Neves IF, Martins VO. Potenciais evocados auditivos pré e pós-tratamento em indivíduos gagos: estudo piloto. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):401-5.
  • Andrade RV, Limongi, SCO. A emergência da comunicação expressiva na criança com síndrome de Down. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):387-92.
  • Capellini SA, Padula NAMR, Santos LCA, Lourenceti MD, Carrenho EH, Ribeiro LA. Desempenho em consciência fonológica, memória operacional, leitura e escrita na dislexia familial. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):374-80.
  • Carrillo L, Ortiz KZ. Análise vocal (auditiva e acústica) nas disartrias. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):381-6.
  • Cattoni DM, Fernandes FD, Di Francesco RC, Latorre MRDO. Características do sistema estomatognático de crianças respiradoras orais: enfoque antroposcópico. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez; 19(4):347-51.
  • Elias KMIF, Santos MFC, Ciasca SM, Moura-Ribeiro MVL. Processamento auditivo em criança com doença cerebrovascular. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):393-400.
  • Fernandes FDM. Emerging issues on the education of SLPs around the globe - different models: Brazil. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):406-7.
  • Lamônica DAC, Ferraz PMDP. Leucomalácia periventricular e diplegia espástica: implicações nas habilidades psicolingüísticas. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4)357-62.
  • Lucas PA , Zacare CC, Alves Filho OC, Amantini RCB, Bevilacqua MC, Zaidan E. Scan: perfil de desempenho em crianças de sete e oito anos. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):370-3.
  • Menezes CGL, Takiuchi N, Befi-Lopes DM. Memória de curto-prazo visual em crianças com distúrbio específico de linguagem. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4):363-9.
  • Silva AC, Pinto FR, Matas CG. Potenciais evocados auditivos de longa latência em adultos com HIV/Aids. Pró-Fono Revista de Atualização Científica. 2007 out-dez;19(4)352-6.

Publication Dates

  • Publication in this collection
    15 Jan 2008
  • Date of issue
    Dec 2007
Pró-Fono Produtos Especializados para Fonoaudiologia Ltda. Condomínio Alphaville Conde Comercial, Rua Gêmeos, 22, 06473-020 Barueri , São Paulo/SP, Tel.: (11) 4688-2220, Fax: (11) 4688-0147 - Barueri - SP - Brazil
E-mail: revista@profono.com.br