HEALTH

Who needs speech therapy and how it might help

11 March, 2024 . 0

Used to treat different communication problems, speech therapy isn’t only suitable for children. Find out whom it’s for, and how it can help.

Think of the word “therapy” and you’ve probably heard of physiotherapy, hypnotherapy or even cognitive behavioural therapy – but what about speech therapy?

Also known as speech pathology, speech therapy can help people who have problems with speaking, listening, reading, writing, understanding language, or stuttering.

It can also be used to diagnose and treat people who have problems using their voice or swallowing, which can make it difficult to eat and drink.

What kind of conditions can speech therapy help?

Speech therapists, or speech pathologists, can help people who have difficulty communicating or swallowing due to a wide range of conditions, including:

Autism spectrum disorder
Cerebral palsy
Childhood apraxia of speech
Dementia
Developmental delays
Hearing loss
Intellectual disability
Parkinson’s disease
Stroke or other brain injury

How speech therapy could help the reading crisis

With one-third of Australian children struggling to read proficiently, Speech Pathology Australia is advocating for a national evidence-based phonics approach to help address the problem, as well as more certified speech pathologists in schools.

“Speech pathologists are highly trained to support children in reading proficiently through a systematic phonics-based approach,” Speech Pathology Australia president Kathryn McKinley says.

Children learning to read need specific teaching to understand that letters represent different sounds and letter-sound patterns – this is known as phonics.

“While some children have diagnosed speech and language disorders, there are also many who may not yet have had this identified,” Kathryn says.

“This is where speech pathologists become indispensable in multidisciplinary teams, to champion inclusive education and support diverse learners.

“By doing so, we can ensure that every child has the opportunity to become the best reader they can be.”

Could music play a role in speech therapy?

A recent study shows that for children with developmental language disorder, listening to music with a regular rhythm at 120 beats per minute improves their capacity to repeat sentences they’ve just heard.

Co-lead author of the study Dr Anna Fiveash, of the MARCS Institute for Brain, Behaviour and Development at Western Sydney University, says it’s a remarkable result.

“This finding that regular rhythms can boost sentence repetition is striking, considering that children with developmental language disorder have particular difficulty in repeating sentences out loud, especially when they are grammatically complex,” Dr Fiveash says.

The study not only sheds new light on neurodevelopmental disorders, the results could also help to supplement current speech therapy guidelines and practices moving forward.

How can you tell if someone needs speech therapy?

There is a wide range of reasons why someone might decide they or their child needs to see a speech pathologist, but some typical scenarios include:

A preschooler who is having trouble communicating or has speech that’s difficult to understand, including by other children they spend time with
A high-school student who stutters and wants to speak more confidently
A person who is finding it hard to learn to read and spell or is having difficulties with their speech
A person who’s finding it difficult to speak clearly after experiencing a brain injury
A person who’s having trouble swallowing because they’ve had a stroke.

Can adults go to speech therapy?

Yes. Speech pathologists or therapists work with people of all ages who are having communication or swallowing difficulties.

Is speech therapy covered by Medicare?

If your GP has prepared a chronic disease management plan for you or your child, Medicare will usually cover some of the costs of an appointment with a speech pathologist.

Do you need a referral to get speech therapy?

Not usually, no. To find a speech pathologist, you can use Speech Pathology Australia’s Find a Speech Pathologist service.

More on speech therapy and some of the conditions it benefits:

Written by Karen Fittall.