Comparing the Role of Speech Therapist in Unique Settings Clinics Special Education and Hospitals

Authors

  • Author- Rooma Imtiaz, Rabia Qamar, Humaira Waseem, Jamshid Haider Malik, Maria Tahir, Sehrish Bari

Abstract

Speech therapy programs are aimed to improve communication skills in children with speech language and communication challenges which may reflect the ability to communicate verbally. The speech language pathologist / therapist (SLP/Ts) operate in various settings such as clinics, special education, and hospitals where they interact with Speech Language Communication Needs (SLCN) of children. The aim of this research was to investigate the difference in therapeutic approach, different view point or knowledge when it comes to a disorder.

Methods

This cross sectional study was conducted for 6 months among three settings clinics, special education and hospitals of Pakistan. Total 105 children participated with 35 participants in each group. An adaptive questionnaire with 5 sections according to our culture and region was given to the participants. Data was analyzed through SPSS version 25.0 and presented through frequency and percentages and ƿ value was collected from different settings clinics, special education and hospitals SLP/Ts by using purposive sampling-techniques.

Results

 There was no considerable difference among the groups in first three sections regarding SLP/Ts knowledge and experience in their different settings like in language behavior indicators, SLCN terminologies, some features associated with speech difficulties but in the other two sections the results showed difference in the features associated with language difficulties and the barriers faced by the SLP / Ts in their settings by exploring knowledge and experience of SLP /Ts.

Conclusion

 It was concluded that clinics and special education SLP / Ts provided much needed recovery services to tackle the SLCN. However the SLP / Ts in special education needed to be taught about SLCN-associated terminologies.

Keywords:

Speech language pathologist/therapist, Hospitals, Special Education, Clinics, Speech Language Communication Needs (SLCN).

Published

2021/09/20