An intensive boot camp approach to the remediation of speech sound disorders: a case report

ABSTRACT

Background: Understanding treatment dose is essential to optimizing therapeutic frequency and intensity for speech sound disorders. Intensive therapies, known as boot camp approaches, have proven efficacious in certain speech therapy contexts such as voice disorder treatment. However, few data exist regarding intervention intensity for developmental speech sound disorders.

Method: This investigation examined the effects of an intensive boot camp speech therapy approach to remediate interdental /s/ production over two consecutive days. Treatment occurred in morning and afternoon blocks for a total of 5.5 h per day. Auditory-perceptual ratings were used to evaluate /s/ productions pre-treatment, immediately post-treatment, and one week following treatment.

Results: Interdental /s/ production improved significantly immediately following the boot camp treatment; improvements were sustained at one week post-treatment (p < .05). Improvement was more pronounced for /s/ productions in medial and final word position versus initial word position.

Conclusion: The findings of this study indicate that an intensive boot camp speech therapy approach might be useful to stimulate or accelerate treatment of speech sound disorders in certain populations. Future research should explore dose–response relationships among treatment frequency, intensity, and duration in children with a variety of speech sound disorders.

KEYWORDS:

• Boot-camp therapy
• treatment dose
• treatment intensity
• evidence-based practice
• speech sound disorders
• speech therapy delivery

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Shawn L. Nissen http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3935-9654

Kristine Tanner http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6973-8490

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by David O. McKay School of Education, Brigham Young University.