application software resident on a server and arranged to interact across a network with a user operating a client device to obtain one or more sample signals of the user's speech;

a datastore arranged to store said one or more user speech samples in association with details of the user;

a feature extraction engine arranged to: extract one or more first features from respective speech samples; extract one or more second features from one or more reference samples, said reference samples comprising a database of speech samples, each sample having a pathology associated therewith, said pathologies comprising: normal, neuromuscular pathologic, physical pathologic and mixed pathologic; and store said second features in association with respective pathologies; and

a comparator arranged to compare said first features extracted from a speech sample with second features extracted from said reference samples and to provide a measure of any differences between said first and second features for assessment of said user.