Snapshot: What is LSVT LOUD?

LSVT stands for Lee Silverman Voice Therapy. It is a speech therapy program that is well researched and widely used in speech pathology for treating dysarthria (slurred or unclear speech) in Parkinson Disease. Individuals with Parkinson Disease often have a quiet voice and slurred speech, and they often do not recognize just how quiet or unclear their speech is. LSVT LOUD is a specific program that trains patients to focus on being louder. This helps the muscles of their vocal folds (you might know them as vocal “cords”) become stronger, and their speech become clearer. Being “loud” doesn’t mean yelling, but means having a strong, supported voice. By focusing just on loudness, patients usually automatically take bigger breaths to support their voice and slow down their rate of speech so that it is understandable. It also helps people “recalibrate” to be better at recognizing when they are speaking too quietly or unclearly.

LSVT LOUD is considered an intense speech therapy program. In this, patients work one-on-one with an LSVT-certified speech-language pathologist for four days a week for four weeks. Daily home practice (10-15 minutes) is also required. After the four-week program, people can join a LOUD for LIFE community program. LOUD for LIFE programs are virtual sessions during which patients can continue practicing their exercises and speaking skills in a group setting. Patients can also check back in with their speech therapist for a one-on-one tune-up session as needed.

Although it wasn’t originally designed for them, LSVT LOUD can sometimes be helpful for people with ataxia. This is especially true for people who have trouble being loud. However, clinical research on the effectiveness of LSVT LOUD on dysarthria in ataxia is limited. In a 2020 study, Dr. Anja Lowit and colleagues investigated an adapted version of LSVT LOUD for people with hereditary ataxia. In this study, the participants attended twice weekly speech therapy sessions for eight weeks via Skype. The researchers found that participants’ vocal function and self-perceptions of their speech improved after the therapy program ended. However, these improvements did not lead to significant improvements in how well they were understood by or how natural their speech sounded to listeners. More research is needed to better understand how LSVT LOUD might benefit people with ataxia.

If you would like to learn more about LSVT LOUD, take a look at this resource by the American Parkinson Disease Association.