The phoniatric vision on communication and its disorders

Abstract

Audiological Medicine is a journal that aims to provide a forum for physicians working in the fi eld of hearing, balance and communication disorders. In the last seven years several issues of the journal have been devoted to hearing or balance disorders, and several papers dealing with hearing and/or balance physiology, pathology and treatment have been published. This is the fi rst issue entirely devoted to communication and its disorders; the authors contributing to this issue belong primarily to phoniatrics, the medical speciality of communication (and swallowing) disorders. This issue represents a further step in the collaboration between audiology and phoniatrics, two medical specialities with several commonalities. In the history of several countries, such as Italy and Mexico (1,2), audiology and phoniatrics were originally two branches of a common fi eld; also, in many European countries, such as Germany, Italy and Poland, these two specialities are combined. The two most important international societies in audiology and phoniatrics, the International Association of Physicians in Audiology (IAPA) and the Union of the European Phoniatricians (UEP), have increased their cooperation in recent years, trying to support each other (3). A journal publishing papers of interest for both audiology and phoniatrics could be a further goal in this cooperation process. The aim of this issue of Audiological Medicine is two-fold: to provide a framework for communication disorders and to give a glimpse on areas of clinical research in this fi eld. In order to achieve this second goal, review articles as well as research papers are presented on issues of the entire age spectrum: papers on verbal communication, both oral and written, as well as non-verbal communications have been included. This issue of Audiological Medicine starts with a paper providing a broad vision of communication and its disorders, together with taxonomic systems. After a brief analysis of the human communication key concepts, the structures, functions, activities, participation and environmental factors contributing the most to communication are described; the ICF (International Classifi cation of Functioning, Disability and Health) terms and defi nitions are used, with the aim to reduce terminology inconsistency. Finally, the classifi cation of communications disorders from a phoniatrics perspective is reported, attempting to give a vision of the entire fi eld. A research paper by Woisard and Lapage on the differences and commonalities between intelligibility and severity of impaired speech highlights the impact of a speech disorder on the listener. The paper contributes to a clearer defi nition of the following concepts: severity, intelligibility and comprehensibility of speech disorders. In the paper of van Opstal et al., the relationship between stressed personality and perceived handicap in voice disordered patients is analysed; this is an example of the impact of voice disorders on quality of life, an area of growing development in the fi eld of phoniatrics. The increasing age of people living in Western countries is a major problem in health system organization; the review of am Zehnhoff-Dinnesen et al. summarizes – from a phoniatrics perspective – the impaired functions that lead to communication limitation and restriction in the elderly. This is an area of high interest not only for clinical research, but also for health administrators. In many papers (2,3), it has been recognized that child deafness is an area of overlap for phoniatrics and Audiological Medicine, 2010; 8: 161–162