Frenchay Dysarthria Assessment – Second Edition (FDA-2)
A standardised assessment of motor speech disorder across seven speech subsystems.
By Claire White
- Clinician-administered; typically 30 to 40 minutes.
- Seven sections: reflexes, respiration, lips, jaws, palate, laryngeal, tongue.
- Each section rated 0 (severe) to 8 (normal).
- Assesses dysarthria (motor speech), not aphasia (language).
- Reference information. It does not diagnose.
What it measures
The FDA-2 assesses the motor subsystems that support speech: reflexes (cough, swallow), respiration, lip movement, jaw movement, palate function, laryngeal function, and tongue movement. Each section is scored on an 8-point scale. The profile shows which subsystems are impaired and to what degree. Dysarthria is a motor speech disorder distinct from aphasia; the FDA-2 is appropriate when the primary impairment is motor, not linguistic.
What the result tells you
Lower scores on any section indicate more severe impairment in that subsystem. The profile guides treatment targets and augmentative communication planning. The FDA-2 can also indicate dysarthria type (spastic, flaccid, ataxic, mixed) based on the pattern of subsystem scores.
Used for
Evidence, psychometrics and provenance
Psychometrics
- Inter-rater reliability
- High for most sections with trained raters
References
- 1.Enderby PM. Frenchay Dysarthria Assessment. Br J Disord Commun. 1980;15(3):165-173.
- 2.Enderby PM, Palmer R. FDA-2: Frenchay Dysarthria Assessment, 2nd ed. Austin TX: Pro-Ed; 2008.