Mrs. DeDe has an upper motor neuron lesion impacting speech intelligibility due to muscle weakness.

• A. Dysarthria
• B. Apraxia of Speech
• C. Dementia
• D. Aphasia

Answer: (A)

Dysarthria is a motor speech disorder caused by weakness, slowness, or poor coordination of the muscles used for speaking (such as the lips, tongue, jaw, and velum) due to a brain lesion. When an upper motor neuron injury affects these muscles, articulation becomes imprecise, sometimes slurred, and intelligibility decreases because the muscles cannot execute movements smoothly. This fits the description of speech impairment driven by muscle weakness.

Apraxia of Speech, in contrast, stems from a problem planning or programming the movements for speech, so strength is typically preserved but sequencing and coordination are disrupted, leading to effortful, groping, and inconsistent errors. Dementia is a cognitive decline affecting memory and thinking, and aphasia is a language-ability disorder, not primarily about muscle weakness.