Management of swallowing and communication difficulties in Down syndrome: A survey of speech-language pathologists

Abstract

Purpose: To explore speech pathology services for people with Down syndrome across the lifespan.

Method: Speech-language pathologists (SLPs) working in Australia were invited to complete an online survey, which enquired about the speech pathology services they had provided to client/s with Down syndrome in the past 12 months. The data were analysed using descriptive statistics.

Result: A total of 390 SLPs completed the survey; 62% reported seeing a client with Down syndrome in the past 12 months. Most commonly, SLPs provided assessment and individual intervention for communication with varying levels of family involvement. The areas of dysphagia and/or communication addressed by SLPs, or in need of more services differed according to the age of the person with Down syndrome. SLPs reported a number of reasons why services were restricted.

Conclusion: There is a need to re-assess the way that SLPs currently provide services to people with Down syndrome. More research is needed to develop and evaluate treatment approaches that can be used to better address the needs of this population.

Keywords:

• Down syndrome
• speech pathology
• communication
• service delivery

Acknowledgements

We are very grateful to all SLPs who took the time to participate in this study. We also acknowledge the valuable assistance of Speech Pathology Australia and the University of Queensland’s School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences Clinical Education Unit for distributing the survey; and Dr Brooke Ryan and Victoria Sandham for their assistance with data preparation.

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.