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Results 1 - 10 of 14
Credit(s): PDHs: 1.0, ASHA CEUs*: 0.1
Summary: Ototoxic medications and chemical agents in the workplace can put individuals' hearing and vestibular health at risk for permanent injury. Proactive ototoxicity management (OtoM) strategies aim to minimize exposure, avoid onset of symptoms, provide ongoing monitoring, and manage auditory and vestibular changes as the clinical needs of the patient evolve. During a 2021 American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Special Interest Groups Open House, members of the International Ototoxicity Management Group discussed how best to integrate OtoM into routine clinical practice, what tools to use, and what special considerations need to be understood to best support patients and their families. Here, we have summarized their viewpoints to encourage widespread adoption of improved OtoM services for at-risk individuals. The field of audiology needs to move to a place where we better understand the full extent of ototoxicity and can agree on expanding minimum guidelines that can be implemented more universally to mitigate, detect, and manage the damage from ototoxic exposures. Only recently has our field seen a therapeutic drug that can protect against ototoxicity; however, the population served is restricted only to children receiving treatment for nonmetastatic carcinoma. This is hopefully just the beginning of future therapeutic interventions to come, but, in the meantime, ototoxicity resulting from other medications in different patient populations and chemical agents persists.
Credit(s): PDHs: 1.0, ASHA CEUs*: 0.1
Summary: As a step toward developing an electrophysiologic method for validating the speech feature discrimination benefits of amplification, the article in this SIG 6 activity evaluates the effect of stimulus level and amplification on the acoustic change complex in adults with sensorineural hearing loss.
Credit(s): PDHs: 1.5, ASHA CEUs*: 0.15
Summary: In the rising digital era, and especially since the pandemic, implementation of telehealth and provision of auditory rehabilitation (AR) using digital platforms have notably increased. This has changed the outlook of service provision by audiologists and speech-language pathologists alike. Digital platforms have the potential to positively impact AR practices by improving accessibility of rehabilitation services as well as by facilitating a more effective way to share resources with both professionals and end users. This SIG 7 activity includes two articles about the accessibility and effectiveness of digital platforms to provide AR services for both adults and children with hearing difficulties. The first article discusses the differences in the distribution strategy, users’ experience, and satisfaction for two digital platforms (a static website and an active blog) offering AR materials for professionals. Their study concludes that social media–focused active distribution is effective because it results in more total traffic, a greater number of users, more frequent access, and an overall high level of satisfaction with the quality of information and resources. The second article discusses the details of a Zoom-based telepractice initial evaluation protocol used by speech-language pathologists serving children who are hard of hearing and their families. This clinical protocol was designed to synchronously share resources and questionnaires with family members of children who are hard of hearing. Authors suggest that providing AR services through telepractice facilitates high-quality diagnostics and counseling to the same extent as that of in-person diagnostic sessions.
Credit(s): PDHs: 4.0, ASHA CEUs*: 0.4
Summary: This SIG 19 activity bundles four articles providing perspectives on a broad variety of topics in speech-language pathology. First, Bunta and Gósy discuss how speech-language pathologists and audiologists could utilize acoustic analyses in their clinical practice. They provide specific examples ranging from aphasia to speech sound disorders and various linguistic contexts to demonstrate the utility of these tools. The authors suggest acoustic analyses can be a valued supplement in clinical evaluations. Next, Diekhoff and Lulich examine speech-language pathology students’ conceptualization and description of American rhotic Sounds. They discuss the differences in descriptions of rhotic sounds by students who had experience with those sounds compared to those who did not have experience with those sounds. The role of direct instruction regarding rhotic shapes is highlighted. Then, Gurevich and Kim discuss quantifying allophonic coverage in commonly used reading passages. In summary, they suggest a need for new speech materials that could provide allophonic coverage. Finally, Jung, Jing, and Grigos investigate the accuracy and consistency of students’ perceptions/ratings of speech errors in children. They report that student clinicians’ ratings matched with expert speech-language pathologists’ ratings with training. The importance and need for listening training in speech-language pathology programs are also discussed.
Credit(s): PDHs: 3.5, ASHA CEUs*: 0.35
Summary: The three articles in this SIG 18 activity were selected to provide information on the present and future of telepractice service delivery from the perspectives of current speech-language pathologists and graduate student clinicians. The first article by Page, Hughes, and Woody investigates the initial perceptions of graduate student clinicians following the implementation of telepractice. Findings reveal themes including comparisons between in-person services and telepractice regarding learning technology, managing environmental distractions at home, and caregiver involvement. The second article by Douglass, Lowman, and Causey-Upton provides a metaanalysis study on clinicians’ perceptions of telehealth across disciplines within rehabilitation and other allied health fields. Several themes are identified, including acceptance, lack of telehealth training, and the flexibility of telehealth. The third article by Edwards-Gaither, Harris, and Perry presents a viewpoint for the future of telepractice in speech-language pathology. Challenges and opportunities for the longevity of telepractice service delivery are discussed, including consensus on telepractice terminology, designating a service delivery model, and exploring telepractice occupational culture.
Credit(s): PDHs: 0.5, ASHA CEUs*: 0.05
Summary: The article in this SIG 6 activity focuses on the audiologic variations seen among patients undergoing the same type of ototoxic drug treatment (cisplatin). Results show a large amount of audiologic outcome variability among the two patients examined, despite similar demographic factors, drug treatments, and types of cancer. Factors relating to ototoxic susceptibility are discussed, and the importance of otoxicity monitoring programs for early detection of audiologic change is highlighted.
Credit(s): PDHs: 3.5, ASHA CEUs*: 0.35
Summary: This SIG 19 activity bundles four articles providing perspectives on a broad variety of topics in speech-language pathology. First, Holt provides an overview of current and historical discussions of gender and race, challenging the reader to accept that one’s perspective is indebted to a specific belief system. Readers are to evaluate how gender and race are used to categorize people and examine whether a member of a marginalized or minoritized group affects that person’s access to or use of intervention services. Next, Cox and Koenig define speech privacy and provide a brief history and applications in the health care setting. A general perspective is outlined, including threats to speech privacy, and speakers who use an electrolarynx are used as an example to highlight specific issues clinicians may encounter. Ramanarayanan et al. discuss the use of speech as a biomarker in therapy and research. In summary, robustness of analytics—specificity, diversity, and physiological interpretability—must be further developed. Finally, Weerathunge, Tomassi, and Stepp review a number of populations with voice disorders that have been studied using altered auditory feedback. Many have hyperactive auditory feedback responses and the differing underling reasons are reviewed. Therapy considerations are also described.
Credit(s): PDHs: 1.5, ASHA CEUs*: 0.15
Summary: These SIG 7 Perspectives articles focus on auditory rehabilitation (AR) for adults with cochlear implants. While the benefits of AR in the population are recognized in the literature, service-delivery models are variable, and there is no gold standard approach to developing and implementing a comprehensive AR program. Glade and colleagues provide an overview of clinical models currently being used for the provision of AR for adults with cochlear implants from nine clinics across the country. The article highlights the importance of interprofessional practice in AR and outlines the roles of professionals included on care teams. There is a discussion about barriers to successful implementation of AR programs, including distance to services, and recommendations for potential solutions, such as teletherapy. In the second article, Mosley describes the process of creating and implementing a comprehensive teleaudiology AR program for older adults who use cochlear implants at the University of South Alabama Speech & Hearing Center.
Credit(s): PDHs: 4.0, ASHA CEUs*: 0.4
Summary: The first article in this SIG 18 activity investigates the applications speech-language pathologists (SLPs) and audiologists used most frequently during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. It also discusses the main obstacles to providing speech, language, and hearing services through telepractice. Through the international distribution of an electronic survey, a total of 1,466 surveys from SLPs and audiologists from 40 countries were used for the analysis. The second article discusses the Auditory Verbal UK's training program for prospective listening and spoken language specialist certified auditory verbal therapists delivered globally via telepractice. The article explores, from a global perspective, audiology and early intervention services and perspectives regarding telepractice. The third article explores parents' and therapists' views of the benefits and challenges of telepractice for early intervention for children who are deaf or hard of hearing during the COVID-19 pandemic. Through survey and analysis, the article probes the views of parents, Listening and Spoken Language Specialist Certified Auditory Verbal Therapists in using telepractice to deliver auditory verbal sessions.
Credit(s): PDHs: 4.0, ASHA CEUs*: 0.4
Summary: The first two articles in this SIG 19 activity provide information to better our assessment and treatment of individuals in the area of voice, while the latter two articles focus on treatment of individuals in the area of speech production. The authors for all four articles present a review of the literature as well as challenges and future directions. First, Van Hook and Duffy conducted a pilot study to trial the Gender Spectrum Voice Inventory. This article provides a review, discussion of validity, and speech-language pathologists’ perceptions of the inventory in an effort to address a gap in available clinical tools for transgender and nonbinary people. Next, Hammer reviews the relationship between air flow with sound pressure level during syllable production while holding fundamental frequency and subglottic air pressure constant. The results have clinical implications that stress the importance of an increase in air flow and focus on vocal fold contact. Then, Gritsyk et al. describe their study to determine which measures of somatosensory acuity best predicted change in production accuracy during vowel learning tasks while controlling auditory acuity. Results indicate only bite block adaptation with auditory masking was significantly associated with performance. Finally, Zajac et al. discuss their preliminary study that indicated cleft type contributes to production errors, specifically backing, in children with repaired cleft palate. Additionally, a history of otitis media affects the spectral contrast of alveolar consonants in children without clefts.
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