Changes in brain activity following intensive voice treatment in children with cerebral palsy

Eight children (3 females; 8–16 years) with motor speech disorders secondary to cerebral palsy underwent 4 weeks of an intensive neuroplasticity‐principled voice treatment protocol, LSVT LOUD®, followed by a structured 12‐week maintenance program. Children were asked to overtly produce phonation (ah) at conversational loudness, cued‐phonation at perceived twice‐conversational loudness, a series of single words, and a prosodic imitation task while being scanned using fMRI, immediately pre‐ and post‐treatment and 12 weeks following a maintenance program. Eight age‐ and sex‐matched controls were scanned at each of the same three time points. Based on the speech and language literature, 16 bilateral regions of interest were selected a priori to detect potential neural changes following treatment. Reduced neural activity in the motor areas (decreased motor system effort) before and immediately after treatment, and increased activity in the anterior cingulate gyrus after treatment (increased contribution of decision making processes) were observed in the group with cerebral palsy compared to the control group. Using graphical models, post‐treatment changes in connectivity were observed between the left supramarginal gyrus and the right supramarginal gyrus and the left precentral gyrus for the children with cerebral palsy, suggesting LSVT LOUD enhanced contributions of the feedback system in the speech production network instead of high reliance on feedforward control system and the somatosensory target map for regulating vocal effort. Network pruning indicates greater processing efficiency and the recruitment of the auditory and somatosensory feedback control systems following intensive treatment. Hum Brain Mapp 38:4413–4429, 2017. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.