Study of Articulatory Movement from the Single Slice Dynamic Imaging of the Vocal Tract in Parkinsonism

S. Senthil Kumaran¹, Sunita Gudwani¹, Mohit Saxena², Madhuri Behari²

Parkinsonism is a degenerative motor disorder where speech production is affected early prior to other voluntary motor functions. Due to this perceptual feature the communication becomes difficult progressively debilitating quality of life of the subject. Clinically assessment of vocal tract dynamics and acoustic analysis are essential for planning management. This study explores the use of single slice real time trufi sequence dynamic MR images as a diagnostic tool for spatial and temporal vocal tract shaping.