Helen Whitelaw, 76, appeared on ITV s Tipping Point in 2019, winning almost £3,000.
A year later, she was diagnosed with motor neurone disease, which makes speech slurred due to failing muscles in the tongue, lips, vocal cords and chest.
But engineers have now used her Tipping Point footage to capture the sound of her voice and build it into a computer aid that enables her to express herself more clearly.
A pensioner whose ability to talk was lost to illness has had her own voice reconstructed on computer – thanks to an earlier appearance on a TV gameshow. Helen Whitelaw, 76, appeared on ITV s Tipping Point in 2019, winning almost £3,000
BBC News
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image captionHelen Whitelaw can speak again in her own voice, using a computer aid, thanks to clips from the TV show
A Scottish woman who lost her speech after developing motor neurone disease (MND) has had it reconstructed using sounds from her appearance on the ITV gameshow Tipping Point.
Helen Whitelaw appeared on the show in 2019, winning almost £3,000.
She was diagnosed with MND the following year, after which her speech rapidly deteriorated.
But engineers took the audio of the 76-year-old s TV appearance and used it to build her voice into a computer aid.
Ms Whitelaw of Glasgow has thanked them for giving me back my voice .
“The diagnosis was devastating for the family,” Whitelaw said. I wanted people to know what I was saying, and I did not want to sound like a machine.”
Supplied Appearing on
Good Morning Britain, alongside her daughter Gillian Scott and
Tipping Point host Ben Shepherd, Whitelaw added, “It is wonderful being able to talk to people and sound normal and not like a machine. My frustration has vanished and I can now have satisfactory conversations with everyone. Scott agreed it was “just the best” being able to hear her mum s voice again.
Supplied
Tipping Point host Ben Shepherd with Helen Whitelaw and her daughter Gillian Scott on Good Morning Britain.