Frame erasure compensation techniques

In a speech coding system which encodes speech parameters into a plurality of frames, each frame having a predetermined number of bits, a predefined number of bits per frame are employed to transmit a speech parameter delta. The speech parameter delta specifies the amount by which the value of a given parameter has changed from a previous frame to the present frame. According to a preferred embodiment disclosed herein, a speech parameter delta representing change in pitch delay from the present frame to the immediately preceding frame is transmitted in the present frame, and the predefined number of bits is in the approximate range of four to six. The speech parameter delta is used to update a memory table in the speech coding system when a frame erasure occurs.