Catholic Education Tasmania - Prevalence and screening pathway project

This week A/Prof Sarah Verdon, Dr Nicola Ivory, A/Prof Kate Crowe and I are working on the ethics, and finalisation of the Catholic Education Tasmania - Prevalence and screening pathway project. It is a privilege to work on this to set up a robust screening pathway for Tasmania.

Monday - Sarah, Nicola and Sharynne at CSU

Monday evening-Kate C (in Iceland) and Sharynne

Tuesday - Sarah, Nicola and Sharynne at CSU

Tuesday afternoon - Lisa, Felicity at CET, Sharynne, Sarah, Nicola at CSU

Thursday afternoon - Felicity, Lisa, Sharyne, Nicola, Udari

Epidemiological papers considering children with low language skills

This newly published paper reviews epidemiological papers considering children with low language 

Hill, E., Calder, S., Candy, C., Truscott, G., Kaur, J., Savage, B., & Reilly, S. (2023). Low language capacity in childhood: A systematic review of prevalence estimates. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders. https://doi.org/10.1111/1460-6984.12944

Our paper that reports data from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC) was included in the analysis - and was rated as "high quality".

McLeod, S., & Harrison, L. J. (2009). Epidemiology of speech and language impairment in a nationally representative sample of 4- to 5-year-old children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 52(5), 1213–1229. https://doi.org/10.1044/1092-4388(2009/08-0085)

 

 

The SAGE encyclopedia of human communication sciences and disorders

The SAGE encyclopedia of human communication sciences and disorders has just been published. The 4-volume encyclopedia was edited by Jack Damico and Martin Ball. The website states "The editors have recruited top researchers and clinicians across multiple fields to contribute to approximately 640 signed entries across four volumes"  Members of our SLM team have written seven of these entries:

1. Blake, H. L. & McLeod, S. Intelligibility enhancement. 
2. Cronin, A. & McLeod, S. Cleft lip and palate: Speech effects. 
3. Cronin, A. & McLeod, S. Craniofacial anomalies.
4. McLeod, S. International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health. 
5. McLeod, S. Prevalence of communication disorders.
6. McLeod, S. & Verdon, S. Multilingualism and speech sound disorders. 
7. Phạm, B. & McLeod, S.  Tone languages and communication disorders.

Anna Cronin with volume 1 (of 4) of the encyclopedia

Prevalence of childhood speech sound disorders

In our role as Chair and Deputy Chair of the Child Speech committee of the International Association of Logopedics and Phoniatrics, Dr Yvonne Wren and I have compiled the following information about prevalence of childhood speech sound disorders.

In a systematic review, prevalence estimates for childhood speech delay only ranged from 2.3 to 24.6% (Law et al., 2000). Since this systematic review, additional prevalence studies have been published.:

• 25.2% parent-identified concerns about how their child “talked and made speech sounds” (11.8% “concerned”; 13.4% “a little concerned”) (n = 4,983; 4-5 years) (McLeod & Harrison, 2009) 
• 12.0% parent-identified “speech not clear to others” (n = 4,983; 4-5 years) (McLeod & Harrison, 2009) 
• 8.7% diagnosed by a speech-language pathologist with “isolated speech impairment”, and 14.3% with “comorbid speech and language impairment” (n = 308; school students) (Jessup, Ward, Cahill & Keating, 2008) 
• 3.8% classified as having speech delay using the Speech Disorders Classification System and stimuli from conversational speech samples and a published word articulation test (n = 1,328; 6 years) (Shriberg, Tomblin & McSweeny, 1999) 
• 3.6% identified as having persistent speech sound disorder in a large population study using > 1.2 standard deviations below the mean on percentage consonants correct scores taken from connected speech samples (n = 7,390; 8 years) (Wren et al., 2016) 
• 3.4% achieved a standard score performance of ≤79 on a speech assessment (n = 1,494; 4 years) (Eadie et al., 2014) 
• 1.7% parent-identified “speech disorders” (n = 12,388; 0-14 years) (Keating, Turrell, & Ozanne 2001) 
• 1.06% teacher-identified “speech sound disorders” (n = 10,425; school students) (McKinnon, McLeod, & Reilly, 2007) 

Period prevalence of childhood speech sound disorders

• United Kingdom: The Middlesbrough Primary Care Trust of the reported period prevalence of speech difficulties was 29.1%, compared with receptive language difficulties (20.4%), expressive language difficulties (16.9%), dysfluency (5.3%), and voice or nasality disruption (2.0%) (Broomfield & Dodd, 2004) 
• United States: 55.8% of children in grades K-3 were scored on speech sound disorder and 74.7% of Pre-K students were scored on the articulation/ intelligibility ASHA Functional Communication Measures (n = >16,000 students) (Mullen & Schooling, 2010) 

References
Broomfield, J., & Dodd, B. (2004a). Children with speech and language disability: Caseload characteristics. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 39(3), 303-324. 

Eadie, P., Morgan, A., Ukoumunne, O. C., Ttofari Eecen, K., Wake, M., & Reilly, S. (2015). Speech sound disorder at 4 years: Prevalence, comorbidities, and predictors in a community cohort of children. Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology, 57(6), 578-584. doi:10.1111/dmcn.12635 

Jessup, B., Ward, E., Cahill, L., & Keating, D. (2008). Prevalence of speech and/or language impairment in preparatory students in northern Tasmania. International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 10(5), 364 - 377. 

Keating, D., Turrell, G., & Ozanne, A. (2001). Childhood speech disorders: Reported prevalence, comorbidity and socioeconomic profile. Journal of Paediatrics & Child Health, 37(5), 431-436. 

Law, J., Boyle, J., Harris, F., Harkness, A., & Nye, C. (2000). Prevalence and natural history of primary speech and language delay: Findings from a systematic review of the literature. International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders, 35(2), 165-188. 

McKinnon, D. H., McLeod, S., & Reilly, S. (2007). The prevalence of stuttering, voice, and speech-sound disorders in primary school students in Australia. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 38(1), 5-15. 

McLeod, S., & Harrison, L. J. (2009). Epidemiology of speech and language impairment in a nationally representative sample of 4- to 5-year-old children. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 52(5), 1213-1229. doi:10.1044/1092-4388(2009/08-0085) 

Mullen, R., & Schooling, T. (2010). The National Outcomes Measurement System for pediatric speech-language pathology. Language, Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 41, 44-60. doi:10.1044/0161-1461(2009/08-0051) 

Shriberg, L. D., Tomblin, J. B. & McSweeny, J. L. (1999). Prevalence of speech delay in 6-year-old children and co-morbidity with language impairment. Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research, 42, 1461-1481. 

Wren, Y., Roulstone, S., Miller, L.L., Emond, A. & Peters, T. (2016). The prevalence, characteristics, and risk factors of persistent speech disorder. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 59, 647-673. 

Compiled by Sharynne McLeod, Charles Sturt University and Yvonne Wren, University of Bristol - 2018

Second Most Prevalent Disability Category in the US

An email was sent to ASHA members from Dr. Lemmietta G. McNeilly, Chief Staff Officer, Speech-Language Pathology containing the following information:

Speech or Language Impairments, Second Most Prevalent Disability Category
"According to the recently released, "37th Annual Report to Congress on the Implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, 2015," speech or language impairments (17.9%) was the 2nd most prevalent disability category in 2013 for students ages 6 through 21 served under IDEA, Part B. The most prevalent category continues to be specific learning disabilities at 39.5%. Other highlights of the report, data from reporting periods associated with fall 2013; include:

• The most prevalent disability category of children ages 3 through 5 served under IDEA, Part B, was speech or language impairments (44.2%). The next most common disability category was developmental delay (37.1%), followed by autism (8.4%).
• Hispanic or Latino students ages 6 through 21 were 1.34, 1.21, 1.29, and 1.06 times more likely to be served under IDEA, Part B, for hearing impairments, orthopedic impairments, specific learning disabilities, and speech and language impairments, respectively, than were students ages 6 through 21 in all other racial/ethnic groups combined.
• Speech or language impairments were the second or third most prevalent category for students ages 6 through 21 in every racial/ethnic group.
•  More than 8 in 10 students reported under the category of speech or language impairments (87.1%) were educated inside the regular class 80% or more of the day."

Lemmietta G. McNeilly, ASHA, 9 February 2016

Australian Senate Community Affairs Reference Committee's final report

The Senate Community Affairs Reference Committee's final report for the inquiry into the prevalence of different types of speech, language and communication disorders and speech pathology services in Australia was released on 2nd September 2014 and can be found here. The tabling of the Senate report is here. Speech Pathology Australia's response is here.

The work of my students and colleagues at CSU has been cited a number of times in the report. It is exciting to see that our work has been useful in advocating for services. The CSU media release is here.

In an email to members of Speech Pathology Australia posted today Gail Mulcair, CEO of Speech Pathology Australia summarized the report as follows:

The Committee made ten detailed recommendations - which direct the Australian Government Department of Health to progress a program of work that will identify, improve, support and expand speech pathology services in Australia. The time for talking is over - the time for government action is at hand. Recommendations include:

• That governments, when developing policy and programs, consider the costs to individuals and the Australian community of failing to intervene to address speech and language disorders.
• That a gap analysis be undertaken of what data is available to identify the current and future need for speech pathology services and how these information gaps could best be filled.
• Improvements to data on communication disabilities collected through the National Census and other governmental data collection systems.
• An analysis of the current service delivery model of speech pathology services in the aged care sector and how this relates to the federal government's aged care reforms.
• A project that maps language support services across Australia against the Australian Early Development Index information about vulnerable children.
• An immediate audit of the current speech pathology services for children in Australia.
• The development of a position paper on the impact of the NDIS on speech pathology services in Australia.
• A strategy to broaden the opportunities for speech pathology students to undertake clinical placements that satisfy the profession's competency based occupational standards.
• An investigation into the geographical and demographic clustering of speech pathology services in Australia with a focus on new graduate positions.
• A cost benefit study of the current level of funding for public speech pathology positions, various service delivery models and the impact on individuals, the speech pathology profession and the Australian community.
• A position paper (jointly developed by the federal Department of Health in collaboration with state and territory governments) on the most effective models of speech pathology services in:
  
  • Early childhood intervention services
  • The educational system
  • The justice system
  • The health system
  • The residential aged care environment.

Australian government inquiry into the social and economic impact of communication and swallowing disorders

Yesterday, the Australian government announced that the Senate Community Affairs References Committee will conduct an inquiry into the social and economic impact of communication and swallowing disorders.The Senate will consider the following questions

1. the prevalence of different types of speech, language and communication disorders and swallowing difficulties in Australia;
2. the incidence of these disorders by demographic group (paediatric, Aboriginal and Torres Islander people, people with disabilities and people from culturally and linguistically diverse communities);
3. the availability and adequacy of speech pathology services provided by the Commonwealth, state and local governments across health, aged care, education, disability and correctional services;
4. the provision and adequacy of private speech pathology services in Australia;
5. evidence of the social and economic cost of failing to treat communication and swallowing disorders; and
6. the projected demand for speech pathology services in Australia.

Read the official Handsard transcript here.

Speech Pathology Australia has been lobbying for this to occur over the past 3 years. This is an enormous step towards national recognition of the needs of Australians with communication and swallowing disorders.