Abstract: Objective To explore the characteristics and rehabilitation of Chinese dysarthria. Methods 31 patients and 63 normal controls were measured with maximum phonation time (MPT), pitch, intensity and mean airflow rate (MAR), forced vital capacity (FVC), forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV₁), maximum midexpiratory flow (MMF), peak expiratory flow rate (PEFR); Nasalance was tested with Nasalance Acquisition System (NasalView); Speech intelligibility was tested with mandarin words card. And alternative movement rate (AMR) were also tested. All the patients were rehabilitated with physiologic approach, 16 patients who finished the course were tested again after rehabilitation. Results MPT, MAR, aspiratory function, AMR of the patients was remarkable lower than those of the control; the nasalance scores of vowel and nonnasal sounds, words, and sentence were remarkable higher than those of the control; the speech intelligibility was also lower. After intervention, MPT, aspiratory function, AMR, and speech intelligibility improved. In the index, only MPT and AMR were correlated with the speech intelligibility. The nasalance of /i/ and nonnasal sentence related with the listener perceptions of hypernasality. Conclusion The aspiratory and phonation function of the patients with dysarthria are impaired. The patients show hypernasality which is a type of resonance abnormity. AMR is declined. Speech intelligibility is much lower. Physiologic approach can improve their phonation, aspiration, articulation and communication ability, but can't for resonance. The longer the MPT, the more /pa、ta、ka/ in specific time, the higher the speech intelligibility. Nasalance could be used for evaluating the hypernasality.

Key words: dysarthria, physiologic approach, speech intelligibility, nasalance, aerodynamic, assessment