Baseplate Not Sticking?
Health
Try This!
By Anne Greenwood
My father, Ronald
Greenwood, had a
laryngectomy in August
2009 at the age of 83. After
three tough months in
hospital, he finally returned
home and looked forward
to attending speech
therapy to learn a new way
to speak. However, Dad’s
physical neck anatomy
proved difficult. His stoma
is oval-shaped, set quite
deeply between tight,
protruding neck muscles.
He found it difficult to
cover it completely with
his thumb and adhesive
baseplates would come
unstuck, allowing air to
escape when he tried
18 THE VOICE | Summer 2013
to speak. Dad was feeling
frustrated and rapidly losing
hope. Even the Speech
Therapist found his case
challenging.
The initial breakthrough
came through a simple
solution. My mother,
Barbara, tied soft material
around a ball of cotton wool,
with a handle, forming a
‘mushroom’ shape. Dad
learnt oesophageal speech
by pressing the bundle of
soft material over his stoma
to stop air escaping – and he
found his voice!
This was an encouraging
start but Dad felt it
wasn’t ideal to carry his