Pediatric Speech Therapy in St. James

If you have concerns about your child's development, pediatric speech therapy can help. Speech-language pathologists help infants, children and families reach maximum function while at home, school and in the community.

Speech therapy can help:

• Correct speech sound errors
• Expand vocabulary
• Improve grammar skills
• Improve listening skills
• Improve social interactions
• Improve swallowing and feeding

How it works

During your first visit, a speech-language pathologist will meet with you to discuss your concerns and observe your child participating in a variety of activities. Examination includes listening and speaking communication skills, including fluency, language, social skills and speech sound errors. The speech-language pathologist may conduct specific testing to assess your child's current abilities.

After the evaluation, the speech-language pathologist will determine if services are recommended and develop a treatment plan that includes frequency for therapy, treatment goals and ideas for home activities.

Care is available for a variety of needs

Speech-language pathologists treat many pediatric speech disorders, which are caused by several conditions:

• Articulation and motor speech disorders, including apraxia/dyspraxia, dysarthria alone or secondary to other diagnoses
• Auditory processing disorders
• Autism spectrum disorders
• Cognitive and attention impairments
• Craniofacial abnormalities
• Developmental delays
• Feeding or swallowing issues and myofunctional/tongue thrust pattern
• Fluency and stuttering
• Genetic syndromes, such as Angelman syndrome, Down syndrome, Turner syndrome and Williams syndrome
• Hearing impairments or multisensory impairments
• Hoarse voice
• Literacy and preliteracy issues
• Neurological disorders, such as cerebral palsy, traumatic brain injury and stroke; seizure disorders; and unspecified neurological dysfunction
• Phonologic disorders
• Receptive and expressive language disorders/delays and specific language impairment
• Semantic or pragmatic language disorders
• Sensory integration dysfunction
• Swallowing
• Voice disorders

Resources

Learn more about these topics:

• Child development
• Children's health
• Parenting
• Pediatric medicine
• Speech and language