Speech Disfluency in Autism Spectrum Disorders

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Re: Parent involvement?

From: Vivian Sisskin
Date: 13 Oct 2007
Time: 15:12:48 -0500
Remote Name: 68.227.196.186

Comments

Elizabeth, Thanks for your interest how parents are involved. As with most treatment planning with children with ASD, the multidisciplinary team approach is very helpful. Each member of the team (including the child, if appropriate) can offer insight into treatment priorities. Parents can be excellent observers and I have found that parents are among the first to alert the SLP of changes in the child’s communication ability or pattern. This was the case for some of the children I have treated with Asperger’s syndrome. In fact, the parents believed that the disfluency was contributing more to poor social communication and peer relationships than other symptoms including excessive monologues on idiosyncratic interests. In cases of autistic disorder, where the children had only limited expressive language skills, parents were less intent on adding fluency goals to the treatment plan. The most immediate concern for me as the SLP was to help the parents, teachers, and support staff understand some basics about fluency and fluency disorders. I also explained the little research that had been done in the area of disfluency in the ASD population as well as various explanations that I could offer.


Last changed: 10/22/07