At the April 2018 meeting of the Stewartry U3a Ruth McMorran, Co-Chair of the Trustees of the charity Communication Matters gave a talk on her work with people with communication difficulties and the supportive work of the charity.
Ruth stressed the importance of Augmentative and Alternative Communication – the means by which people can communicate – through speech, gestures, pointing, signing, use of pictures and use of technology. These different techniques may be used in communicating with children who have difficulty in communicating as a result of cerebral palsy, learning difficulties and other issues and adults who have Parkinson’s, MS or Motor Neuron disease. The techniques can assist in allowing those affected to express their needs, interact with others and improve general social inclusion.
Technological developments and applications are now an important means of enabling people to communicate and Ruth demonstrated a number of items which allow people to express their needs including electronic keyboards with not just letters but with phrases and expressions. These can be operated by a variety of means and she instanced the late Professor Stephen Hawkins who had a sensor on his cheek which had allowed him to operate his device. One of the latest developments is eye gaze technology which allows the person to move letters on a screen.
Another development is called “voicebanking”, where people about to lose their voice can record their voice or volunteers record their voices for use with technological devices in place of the more usual synthetic voices.
Communication Matters is actively involved in the development of Augmentative and Alternative Communication, in raising awareness of the issues and encouraging research.