title: Toffee clearance and lingual sensory and motor activities in normal children and in children with articulation problems of speech.
abstract: The rate at which a standardized mouthful of toffee containing technetium (99mTc) tin colloid was cleared from the mouth during and after chewing was measured by counting the residual radioactivity in the mouth at short time intervals by external gamma counting. The clearance curve was resolved into three phases for each subject--chewing time (1), which coincided with the time to reach 10% of the initial counting rate, scavenging time (2), and a final slow diffusion phase (3). Although the mean chewing time was only 1.9 min, the technique allowed the pattern of clearance during this phase to be assessed for each of 10 normal children (mean age 11.1 yr) and 7 children (mean age 11.0 yr) diagnosed as having delayed articulation. Two measurements of sensory and motor functions of the tongue were made on the same subjects. These measurements were of oral stereognosis and tongue-tip manipulation. Within the control group, only the correlation between stereognosis error scores and the duration of phase 1 or phases 1 and 2 combined was statistically significant. The mean stereognosis and tongue manipulation scores were significantly lower in the poor articulation group than in normal children but, with one notable exception, the clearance curves were similar.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physiology, London Hospital Medical College, England.
authors.forename: R L
authors.initials: RL
authors.lastname: Speirs
authors.forename: P M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Dean
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001072:Apraxias / Q000503:physiopathology*; D001184:Articulation Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D002182:Candy; D002648:Child; D003102:Colloids; D005260:Female; D005947:Glucose / Q000493:pharmacokinetics; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008409:Mastication; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012463:Saliva / Q000378:metabolism*; D013236:Stereognosis; D013667:Technetium; D017556:Technetium Compounds; D013997:Time Factors; D014001:Tin; D017971:Tin Compounds; D014059:Tongue / Q000294:innervation / Q000503:physiopathology*
chemical_list: D003102:Colloids; D017556:Technetium Compounds; D017971:Tin Compounds; C033493:technetium Tc 99m tin colloid; D013667:Technetium; D014001:Tin; D005947:Glucose