Speech-language therapists provide treatment to people in hospital, at outpatient clinics and in their home.
Speech-language therapists manage communication disorders in adults, including:
- difficulty with expressing or understanding language
- unclear speech
- voice problems.
They also assess and treat swallowing and feeding problems in adults, tamariki and pēpi.
Swallowing difficulties in adults
Signs of swallowing difficulties in adults include:
- coughing or choking when eating
- recent weight loss or failure to gain weight
- complaints of discomfort when eating
- difficulty getting food down
- recurrent chest infections.
Communication or swallowing problems in adults may be caused by:
- stroke
- traumatic brain injury
- neurological conditions such as a subarachnoid haemorrhage or brain tumour
- head and neck cancer
- dementia
- progressive neurological diseases such as motor neurone disease, Parkinson's disease or multiple sclerosis
- voice impairments such as vocal nodules or vocal fold palsy
- tracheostomy
- chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
- cardiac surgery.
Swallowing difficulties in pēpi and tamariki
Signs of swallowing difficulties in pēpi and tamariki include:
- refusal to eat or feed
- having to be forced to feed
- breath-holding or choking when feeding
- coughing when feeding
- noisy swallowing or breathing when feeding
- failure to thrive, or poor weight gain
- failure to progress across food textures as expected.
Swallowing problems in pēpi and tamariki may be caused by:
- developmental conditions such as Down syndrome, cerebral palsy or autism
- structural deficits such as cleft palate
- reflux or cow's milk protein intolerance
- developmental delay
- negative early feeding experiences
- injury resulting from complications at birth
- behavioural challenges
- brain injury
- environmental factors such as bottle feeding or position during feeding.