E. Brauneis
Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Acupuncture, Vienna, Austria
Acupuncture Institute for use as an additive to speech and language therapy for disorders of communication.
This paper is a survey of our experiences with this procedure over the past 22 years. It presents an update on previously published results of this form of therapy for stuttering (all age groups, including developmental dysfluency in 3-5 year-olds), and for hearing-impairment in children and teenagers. The effects of acupuncture on aphasia and dyslexia will also be discussed.
There is increasing evidence that cortical and subcortical structures are involved in the generation, organization and production of language and that an imbalance in these processes underlies many disorders of communication. Modern research has shown that acupuncture is able to influence neurophysiological and neurochemical (neurotransmitter) processes. When used as an additive to speech therapy it appears to influence central language processing and improve the results of speech and language therapy.