Speech question.

[Christi in OH]

Any ideas what would be causing Ronnie to loose sounds and words? Last year she could very clearly say "trick or treat" this year it was so garbled I thought she was muttering something about Christmas. I feel bad because I didn't realize what she was saying until Halloween day. :sad:

There have also been other words she has "lost" or can't say any more. Everyone who has evaluated her says she is preverbal. I hear her saying well into the hundreds of words and putting words together. She just is hard to understand unless you are around her alot. I even have trouble sometimes especially if it is out of context.

Just wondering if anyone has any ideas what could be causing this word loss and if there is anything I could do to help her. :unsure:

[Alice R]

I have not heard of this with a child with DS.

I will think about it and see if I remeber anything.

[ChristineM]

Any chance of hearing loss?

[Hollie in SC]

Noah has dropped words, too. He used to say milk and some other words around age 3 that he stopped saying over time. However, he has added other words.


I know that a toddler may lapse in a skill when focusing on something else. I always wondered if there is similar going on. :unsure: He is at the ENT and audiologist often so I know it isn't that.

[Alice R]

I know that a toddler may lapse in a skill when focusing on something else.

That is the only thing that I can think of. When a child is developing in one area, sometimes the other area takes a backseat.

It's common for children to start walking and then slow down with the talking.

Other than that...nothing comes to mind.

Have you checked for fluid in the ears?

[Christi in OH]

I hadn't thought of either of those things. She has had a stuffy nose for over 2 weeks now, she has never had any trouble with her ears.

I don't know about developmentally on other things, but that could be it too. Hmmm.

Thanks!

[Shannon P]

DS carries an increased risk of hearing impairment, though I'm not sure if it's separate or associated with occurrences of facial malformations. A full hearing evaluation might be worthwhile to rule it out.

Has she been doing any new therapies in that time? I've heard of children regressing when a therapy begins, or when it wasn't appropriate or wasn't performed properly.

[Chalane (FL)]

Does she have ear infections often or ear tubes? Joey (ds-9) is very dif. to understand and I had his hearing checked using ABR (audio brain response-I think) since he couldn't understand what to do during a regular hearing test. Turned out he had mild to moderate hearing loss. I should mention he'd had ABR as a baby and they had been normal. You may want to ask the ENT about it, don't be surprised if the ins. co. insists on trying a regular booth test 1st. and she may need to be sedated if they do an ABR.