Voiced based communication for people with dysarthria based on AAC

For the first time, people with dysarthria can use voice commands to communicate.

VocaTempo is the world’s first voice input augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) app. It is designed for people with dysarthria and allows them to use voice commands to speak phrases.

VocaTempo quickly learns to recognise your vocalisations - simply click to record your speech and save it. If you’re not happy with the recording you can review or re-record at any time. When you’ve recorded 8 different recordings of each vocalisation you can use your speech to select phrases on screen. The more vocalisations you save the more phrases you are able to choose from and speak.

VocaTempo is a great way to tell people about yourself and your favourite stories. Once you’ve entered them you can quickly access them using your voice to select the message that you want to play. It’s easy to set up cells with a phrase and image and pair it with your vocalisation. Then when you’re in speaking mode, you can use your voice to activate it and read out the sentence.

VocaTempo also continually learns to improve it’s recognition of your voice. Each time you use the app to speak these recordings are saved and used to help VocaTempo recognise your speech in the future. You can also easily delete them or turn the continuous learning feature off.

Main features:

Voice recognition for dysarthric speakers.

Make an unlimited number of communication pages.

Use voice to select the onscreen message that you would like to communicate.

Create new pages using templates.

Quickly get started with inbuilt stories about football, holidays, trips to the zoo or studying.

Review and re-record any vocalisations at any time.

Adjust the recording and countdown duration.

VocaTempo will listen to your speech when you tap on screen or use a switch.

Continuous learning means that VocaTempo constantly improves it’s recognition of your voice.

VocaTempo underwent a full clinical evaluation across 3 sites in 2018. After just one session with VocaTempo 80% of users were able to generate a message faster using speech commands and one user said “That is faster than I’d ever imagined… it’s so amazing, because I’m speaking."

The app is a collaboration between Therapy Box, University of Sheffield, Barnsley hospital and SBRI healthcare.