The speech abilities and quality of life of Malaysian school-aged children with cleft lip and palate

Lim HH 1 , Bressmann T 2 , Pang AJ 1 , Hamid BA 1 , Ibrahim HM 3

Affiliations 

  • 1 Speech Sciences Program, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), Jalan Raja Muda Abdul Aziz, 50300, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
  • 2 Department of Speech-Language Pathology, University of Toronto (UofT), University Ave, 500, Toronto, ON, M5G 1V7, Canada
  • 3 Speech Sciences Program, School of Rehabilitation Sciences, Faculty of Health Sciences, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), Jalan Raja Muda Abdul Aziz, 50300, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Electronic address: hasherah@ukm.edu.my
Int J Pediatr Otorhinolaryngol, 2025 Feb 22;191:112282.
PMID: 40014886 DOI: 10.1016/j.ijporl.2025.112282

Abstract

PURPOSES: The study investigated the relationship between speech outcomes and quality of life (QoL) among Malay-speaking school-aged children with CLP.

METHODOLOGY: Forty-nine children with CLP (age range 7-11 years) completed an online or in-person speech assessment and filled in the CLEFT-Q (Malay Version) questionnaire, which assessed QoL. An experienced SLP rated the nasality and speech intelligibility of the patients' speech samples.

RESULTS: Based on the auditory-perceptual ratings, 63.3 % of the children had normal resonance, and 71.5 % had normal or near-normal speech intelligibility. The appearance of "teeth'' was rated as the poorest feature by all participants (52.71), while "psychological function" was rated as the best outcome (83.49). Weak correlations were found between speech intelligibility and speech distress (r = -0.450, p 

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

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