#what a time to try and be a speech language pathologist in the school setting

[imminent-danger-came]

me too mr. john green

[phonologix-1]

The Benefits of Early Speech Therapy for Children

Early childhood is a critical period for language and communication development. Speech therapy, when introduced early, can make a transformative difference in a child’s ability to communicate effectively, interact socially, and excel academically.

In this blog, we’ll explore the key benefits of early speech therapy, why it matters, and how it supports a child’s overall development.

Why Early Speech Therapy Matters

The early years of life, particularly from birth to age 5, are marked by rapid brain development. This period is ideal for learning new skills, including speech and language. Early intervention during this time helps children overcome developmental delays, ensuring they don’t fall behind their peers.

Children with speech or language difficulties who receive therapy early are more likely to achieve better long-term outcomes in communication and socialization.

Signs Your Child May Need Speech Therapy

Early intervention is most effective when parents and caregivers recognize the signs of speech or language delays. These signs may include:

Difficulty pronouncing words or forming sentences.

Limited vocabulary for their age.

Trouble understanding or following directions.

Lack of gestures like pointing or waving by 12 months.

Difficulty interacting with peers or adults.

If you notice these signs, consulting a speech-language pathologist (SLP) can provide clarity and guidance.

Key Benefits of Early Speech Therapy

1. Boosts Communication Skills

Early speech therapy focuses on developing essential communication skills, both verbal and nonverbal. Therapists help children articulate words, build vocabulary, and improve sentence structure. For nonverbal children, alternative communication methods such as sign language or AAC devices are introduced.

2. Improves Social Interaction

Speech therapy fosters social communication, enabling children to connect with peers and family members. By teaching skills like turn-taking, eye contact, and active listening, therapy helps children build meaningful relationships.

3. Enhances Academic Readiness

Language and communication are foundational for learning. Early speech therapy equips children with the skills needed to understand instructions, engage in classroom discussions, and express their ideas effectively, setting them up for success in school.

4. Reduces Frustration and Behavioral Issues

Children with speech or language delays often experience frustration due to their inability to communicate needs or emotions. Therapy helps them express themselves more clearly, reducing tantrums and improving emotional regulation.

5. Encourages Confidence and Independence

As children make progress in therapy, their confidence grows. They become more willing to interact with others, try new activities, and explore their environment independently.

6. Promotes Long-Term Success

The skills learned in early speech therapy provide a strong foundation for future communication and social interactions. Addressing issues early minimizes the risk of persistent challenges later in life.

What Happens During Speech Therapy?

Speech therapy sessions are tailored to each child’s unique needs and developmental level. Common techniques include:

Play-Based Learning: Using games and toys to engage children and encourage speech.

Modeling and Repetition: Demonstrating correct speech patterns for the child to imitate.

Articulation Exercises: Practicing sounds and words to improve clarity.

Language Activities: Building vocabulary through storytelling, singing, or picture cards.

The Role of Parents in Early Speech Therapy

Parents and caregivers play a vital role in supporting speech therapy. Therapists often provide strategies for reinforcing skills at home, such as:

Reading together daily.

Encouraging conversations during routines like mealtime or playtime.

Praising efforts to communicate, even if imperfect.

Active parental involvement amplifies the impact of therapy and ensures consistent progress.

When to Start Speech Therapy

Early speech therapy is most effective when introduced as soon as a delay or difficulty is identified. While some children may naturally catch up, waiting too long can delay critical intervention. Trust your instincts as a parent—if you’re concerned, consult a speech-language pathologist for an evaluation.

Conclusion

Early speech therapy is a powerful tool for helping children overcome communication challenges and achieve their full potential. By addressing issues early, parents can provide their children with the skills and confidence they need to thrive socially, academically, and emotionally.

If you’re concerned about your child’s speech development, don’t hesitate to seek professional guidance. Early action can make all the difference in shaping your child’s future.

Would you like tips on choosing a speech therapist or activities to try at home? Let me know!

[sadafs]

hi! i’ve seen you mention a few times that you're a linguist? i’m thinking about pursuing a career as a speech therapist or sociolinguist or such, and i was wondering if you'd be willing to share any quick advice or what-I-wish-I'd-known or anything along those lines? (of course, if it’s not too much of a bother!)

hey yeah! im currently studying for a ling BA. i’m likely going a computational route so stuff like natural language processing, machine learning, AI etc but there are a lot of other paths. 

for sociolinguists, the traditional path is undergrad > phd > postdoc position > try to get tenure-track. its really difficult, and phd programs vary in acceptance rates based on who is researching what at that particular moment in a research program. often, you can apply to many programs one year and get in nowhere, and apply to the same programs a year later and get into at least a few. i’m unsure how much you know about the grad student struggle, but for general advice, don’t do programs that aren’t fully funded (you are meant to be paid to be part of the program). research the faculty in the grad dept and base where you apply off of how overlapping your interests are with the existing people there. labs and program heads want people who are passionate not only about their own research but their research as well. 

there’s also something to be said for how hard it is to get an academic position these days, and how productive you need to be from a research publishing perspective to be taken seriously and be considered a desirable hire. 

but once you acquire a postdoc position, you get a lot of freedom wrt what you research in your free time which is always the largest draw of something like an academic position. with sociolinguistics, however, my main interest is how to apply research towards the public good; this is in part why i’m doing computation stuff now, and *intend* to do my socioling phd later once i have savings and a better idea of where sociolinguistics is going. it’s frustrating that i can read the same articles and books talking about linguistic discrimination but never hear about who else is reading that research besides linguists. 

in terms of setting yourself up well (and again, i dont know at which part of the process you’re at) i’d recommend trying to do sociolinguistic research with a professor at your own university during undergrad, and then applying to share your research at conferences and mini symposiums and all that. also, look at the kind of research that big socioling conferences like NWAV are including, as it can reveal trends in what people want to study right now, which is likely gonna help with applications. 

speech pathology is quite a different beast, although it has shared points of study with socioling like phonetics/phonology. most sociophonetic research is acoustically centered, whereas most speech pathology research/work concerns articulatory gestures. i know a lot less about speech pathology, other than that there is a really good program for that at emerson college. its a little more straighforward of a path (afaik) just because speech pathology programs aim for a technical training and there’s a traditional type of clientele- like, it’s a trade, whereas sociolinguistics is usually an open-ended research/professorial gig in an academic economy that has very few spots. i’d recommend talking to people you know who are speech pathologists about this. 

which overall is good advice- reach out to professors (not only at your university) with questions through email if you can, reach out to alumni from your school with your degree through linkedin to ask how they got to the position they’re at now, be it socioling or speech pathology. i’m still only graduating this semester and these are both fields i’m not pursuing at present so i know like, 2 things. hope this was helpful! and feel free to ask more qs if you want if you wanna message me directly 

[ratscabies]

tag game

thank you @claudyn for tagging me!! 💖

1. nicknames

Katie, Kate, a few nicknames based off of my last name too

2. zodiac sign

gemini (it’s gemini season!!! rock n roll, buckaroo!!!!!!)

3. height

5′7″-ish

4. hogwarts house

Ravenclaw, I guess?? I feel less Ravenclaw now than I did when I was younger, but I don’t feel like I fit anywhere else and I still usually get Ravenclaw as my result when I take any type of sorting quiz online lol

5. last thing I googled

lower calorie birthday cake alternatives (since my bday is this weekend but I’m trying to be good and not let a bday binge derail my weight loss)

6. fave musicians

my favorite bands are like The Clash, The Undertones, The Birthday Party, Einstuerzende Neubauten, and The Damned

7. song stuck in my head

I saw The Damned on Friday and so I’ve had a lot of their songs in my head since then, but particularly Plan 9 Channel 7

8. following

ope like 543 ppl but a lot of them are inactive and I’m too lazy to go through and unfollow

9. followers

1,652 but honestly I’ve had this blog for like nine years now so a chunk of them are inactive or porn bots lol

10. do you get asks

very rarely tbh

11. amount of sleep

either an excessive amount of sleep or no sleep at all!! nothing in between!!

12. lucky number

77 bc I’m very cool and edgy and punk

13. what are you wearing

a black dress with like a scoopy neckline and a layer of black lace over the skirt

14. dream job

billionaire trophy wife is ideal, but in case that doesn’t pan out for me, I’m also looking into becoming a swamp witch or local cryptid

(actually tho I think I’m going to go back to school soon to become a speech-language pathologist)

15. dream trip

I’d like to go to New Orleans for the first time or maybe go back to Ireland

16. instruments

despite all of the instruments I own, I can’t play shit and never followed through learning any of them lmao

17. languages

English is my native language

I studied German language and literature in uni and have a degree in it

I took four years of French in high school but haven’t touched the language since 2013, but my reading comprehension is still passable enough

and I’m currently self-studying American Sign Language with a bunch of internet and book resources, but I hope to take actual classes in the near future

and actually I just have a bunch of languages that I’d like to study in the future - I studied linguistics in uni (along with German) and so I just luv languages and figuring out how they work in general

18. fave song

oof this is too hard for me to answer, I don’t really have set favorites when it comes to songs

19. random fact

I’m actually pretty decent at some creative stuff like drawing and embroidery, and I go through periods where I get heavily involved in stuff like that, but then I just lose all interest and never finish any of these creative projects bc I’m the actual worst lol

20. aesthetics

bold eyeshadow with heavy eyeliner and mascara, matte liquid lipstick in nudes and dusty pinks and reds and purple-grays, vinyl records, Berlin, all/mostly black outfits, black and gray tattoos, bats, ravens and crows, lemony desserts, ouija boards, tarot cards, classic horror films, stacks of unread books everywhere, silver and black jewelry, the chill of an autumn breeze, the sound of Rowland S. Howard’s guitar

I tag...

@kingink2 and @homo-trashcanicus (if y’all wanna do it! no pressure!) and anyone else who sees this and wants to do it!

[treasuredsouls]

      having a baby was not in hikari’s goals. she was newly engaged and in the middle of planning her wedding to tianyu. her training as an speech language pathologist ( for children and young adults ) was barely off of the ground : she had three years of her undergraduate degree under her belt and was barely a senior starting her fourth year. what little free time hikari enjoyed outside of work and school was split between her love and her paternal grandmother, who was starting to have major difficulties with her health. hikari had scarcely turned 21 when she discovered that she was 2 months pregnant with her first child.

      this news caused a major upset in her life. children were always something she considered but never wanted until she was at least 30. in many ways, she hoped to imitate her mother and have children later. she and tianyu had discussed the matter at length several times, and they were happy as they were.

      tianyu took the discovery in stride. in the face of hikari’s anxieties, he promised to stay home with the baby while she pursued her schooling and career. his string of odd jobs was flexible, and he could always work on cars again once their child was older. it was most important for him that hikari chase the dream she was already so invested in. several long talks with melissa helped soothe hikari, as well. melissa offered to babysit when tianyu needed breaks and quickly became hikari’s greatest source of comfort regarding her sudden surprise. melissa knew the couple would make excellent parents, and, frankly, there wasn’t a challenge out there that hikari dojima couldn’t beat if she put her mind to it. ( much the same sentiment daigo often fondly said regarding his wife. )

      hikari decided to try a number of creative means to inform her father that she was pregnant. unfortunately, she failed to account for the one aspect of daigo that melissa knew well to accommodate : daigo was a very intelligent but lovably dense ( truthfully literal ) man. he seemed to miss every pointed question, subtle hint, or set up planned by his daughter to let him know he would be a grandfather soon. after watching hikari struggle for two weeks with every trick she could find online, melissa finally intervened. she sat daigo down, took his hands, and told him directly. hikari was flabbergasted, though she had to laugh at her mother’s quiet “I told you, sweetheart.”

      hikari and tianyu were married later in hikari’s pregnancy. it wasn’t quite the day she had initially expected, but she loved every moment regardless. In some ways, that they would welcome their baby ( who remained nameless and was referred to as “the surprise” ) so soon after made it all the sweeter for her. tianyu ultimately took the dojima name in place of his given surname with his mother’s acceptance. he could have cared less that it was against tradition. the dojima name was a proud one with an important history, and he hated to see hikari lose it over what he saw as outdated beliefs.

      there were questions as to why the couple didn’t postpone their wedding to lift that burden from their shoulders. tianyu left the choice to hikari. her reasoning was rather straightforward : she wanted her paternal grandmother to be there. hikari was concerned that waiting too long would mean yayoi dojima wouldn’t see her get married. as the future dojima matriarch ( a duty that she lovingly took to heart, as her mother had before her ), it was too significant to hikari to have all generations gathered there. tianyu respected her wishes and carried along with the endeavor.

      hikari and tianyu’s baby was a girl. at the hospital, hikari requested that they call her yayoi after her grandmother. melissa was present for hikari’s labor ; when daigo arrived following the birth to check on his daughter and new granddaughter, hikari and tianyu requested permission from him to use yayoi’s name together. melissa, who was warned before her husband arrived, helped to dry daigo’s face once he choked out his approval. her eyes were still shimmering with her own tears, which had scarcely stopped falling as daigo walked in. the family had lost the legendary dojima matriarch in the brief window between hikari’s wedding and what would have been the birth of yayoi’s first great - grandchild, and the hole caused by the absence of such a pillar as yayoi’s name prompted hikari’s idea. she hoped that in giving her daughter the name yayoi, the baby would grow up as determined and cunning as her grandmother.

[grootiez]

The Joys of Raising a Teenaged Groot- Chapter 35: Reminiscence

After visiting hours were over, Rocket went back to the motel that he was staying at. He undressed himself, jumped into the shower, and got changed into his pajamas. After climbing into bed, the raccoon flipped through the channels on the ancient TV. (Of which there was only three, and they were all educational crap and none of those shows interested Rocket.) Rocket tries to hack the TV so that he could get some of the good channels and a little bit better reception so the picture wasn’t as grainy and staticky, but even that proved fruitless. He then got out his top-of-the-line gaming laptop and decided to at least play a couple of games he installed on his PC, but since he was on a different planet and the game, World of Warcraft, was on Terra, he would need a signal strong enough to carry  his wifi connection to Earth and back. Since the motel he was staying at had shoddy wifi at the best, playing the game, or even going on the internet was out of the question.

So the only option for Rocket was to rifle through the bag of old movies that he brought with him. After searching for something good to watch, he found nothing. But, as he looked in the bottom of the bag, he saw an old VHS tape labeled “Guardians Family Moments”.

“I-I don’t remember packing this in the bag...” Rocket was confused as to how the video tape ended up in his bag. He then remembered that Peter helped him with his bags to the car when it was time for the raccoon to move into temporary housing while Groot was being rehabilitated at the nursing home for an undetermined amount of time. “Star-Munch...” He whispered to himself as he held the tape.

The raccoon plopped the tape into the VCR and an old reel of various moments of the Guardians’ life as a newly formed team, and more importantly, a family played. There were touching moments of everyone, but Rocket payed close attention to the moments between him and Groot that were captured on camera.

The first scene was when Groot was reborn and started to move around. Rocket was so elated that he had his best friend back and vowed to protect him from any harm that befell him. The raccoon wishes that he was more protective over Groot, knowing what has happened to him in the last few months.

Rocket fast fowarded to the next part. This was when Groot was starting to mimic words and everyone was seated around the tiny twig inside of his pot, which was lovingly decorated by Rocket. Groot was trying his best and the Guardians were encouraging him to speak (although Peter was hoping that he would say something other than “I am Groot.” He was coaxing the tiny twiglet to say “Starlord is the best!”) At last the tiny Flora Colossus spoke.

“I... I... am... Groot!” Groot exclaimed as he held his tiny branch arms up towards Rocket, wanting the raccoon to pick him up.

As Rocket held the baby Flora Colossus in his arms, he couldn’t believe what Groot’s first word was.

“So, what did he say?” Peter impatiently asked. “It better have been ‘Starlord is the best uncle in the entire galaxy!’” He playfully teased Groot as the sapling tries to hide in Rocket’s fur for protection.

“He definitely didn’t say that, Star-Munch.” Rocket snarled at the Terran as he handed Groot off to Gamora.

“Then what was it, Rocket?” Gamora, who let Groot play with her hair asked as the baby giggled.

Rocket smiled as Gamora handed Groot back to him. “Dad.” The raccoon wiped a tear from his eyes as he looked at his son. “He called me ‘Dad.’”

Rocket reflects on this part. He knows that no matter how well Groot mastered the speech synthesizer, he’ll never hear his son say “Dad” in his own natural voice ever again.

The tape then showed Groot’s first steps. Rocket had set Groot’s pot on the counter, in order to give the tiny Flora Colossus a bath, even though Groot wanted cookies first. As soon as Rocket turned his back to check the water temperature in the sink that Groot was to be bathed in, the tiny tree extended his tiny arms to the shelf that the cookie jar was on and began to lift himself up to it. Unfortunately, Groot’s coordination wasn’t the best and his arms let go of the shelf as he slowly fell to the floor. Luckily, Gamora entered the kitchen at the right time as Groot was free falling to the ground in slow motion and caught him just before his pot hit the floor.

“Groot! Groot!” Rocket was frantic as he rushed over to Gamora, who held Groot’s pot with the twig in it, in her arms. “What the-. What the flark were you trying to do?”

“I am Groot!” Groot replied in his most adorable voice as Gamora handed him to Rocket.

“I told you that you would get some cookies after your bath, not before.” Rocket said as he caught his breath. Groot then got upset and began to cry. “No, no, Groot, I’m sorry that I said that. I just want you to be safe and happy.” The raccoon then proceeded to rock Groot back in forth in his arms. “I love you, son.”

Groot’s tears stopped, the tiny tree looking up at his father. Rocket felt Groot shift his weight in his pot. He mentions this to Gamora and they carry Groot over to the table.

As Gamora examines Groot’s roots underneath the soil, she sees something amazing. “Rocket.” She began as she shifted some of the dirt around so that he could get a better look. “Groot’s ready to come out of his pot. He has legs now.”

Rocket was happy. Groot has reached another milestone in his development, growing legs and being able to leave his pot and explore the environment around him for the first time. At first Groot was crawling on his hands and knees, just like any other toddler. But unlike other toddlers, Groot’s surroundings were filled with dangerous things. Everything that was normally found in family homes that was a potential safety risk to a now-mobile toddler was now within his reach. But unlike other families, the Guardians’ house was filled with other hazards, the most luring items in Rocket’s workshop, which contained various weapons, bombs, and DEATH BUTTONS that were especially tempting to Groot. After multiple failed attempts to keep Groot out of Rocket’s workshop, (neither their warnings or time outs worked on the little tree that was entering the Floral Colossi version of “The Terrible Twos.”) The only option was to babyproof (or in the Guardians’ case, “Grootproof”) the entire Milano, paying particular attention to the kitchen and bathroom cabinets, anywhere Groot could sneak off to or hide in without the Guardians knowing, and Rocket’s workshop. ESPECIALLY Rocket’s workshop, where any of the weapons, bombs, and DEATH BUTTONS could pose a danger, not only to the Guardians, but to the entirety of Xandar should Groot get his branches on one and ACCIDENTALLY activate it.

Well, the aforementioned “Grootproofing” was only successful for only a day. It didn’t take Groot long how to figure out how to undo the baby locks on the cabinet doors. He also discovered how to climb over the baby gates and various barriers that blocked him from having free range of the house. (All he had to do was extend his arms around to where he could hoist himself over the obstacles.) It took the toddler a little longer to figure out how to get into Rocket’s workshop, but when he did, the Guardians gave up their “Grootproofing” plan and settled on just HEAVILY SUPERVISING the tiny tree wherever he went in the house or on the Milano.

The next part of the video was Groot’s first day of preschool. The little guy was nervous as he clung tightly to Rocket’s jumpsuit as the raccoon carried his son to the preschool entrance. As soon as the duo approached the door (The other Guardians stood proudly as they watched father and son go up the steps of the preschool together.)

Rocket placed Groot on the ground as the tiny Flora Colossus looked around nervously as Rocket straightened up his school uniform that had the school seal of The Xandar Academy for Gifted and Exceptional Students emblazoned on the front pocket of his blazer jacket. “Hey, don’t be nervous, Groot. You’re going to have a lot of fun, meet new kids, and your teachers are going to teach you a lot.” He said as he knelt next to Groot and handed the toddler his Bob Ross backpack and his Limited Edition Bob Ross tin lunchbox.

Rocket smiled as Groot took ahold of the lunchbox and stared in amazement at the embossed impression of his idol, Bob Ross, on it. “You better cherish that lunchbox because it’s going to be your only lunchbox through school. I don’t want to hear you complain, you’re even going to carry that lunchbox with you through high school. Costing us 50,000 units just for a lunchbox with a flarkin’ humie on it. Well, at least he ain’t as ugly as Quill.”

Groot stared at Rocket in confusion. “I am Groot?” The toddler squeaked out as he put his backpack on.

Rocket took Groot’s hand into his own. “Nothing, Groot. You just think about meeting and making new friends.” He reassures his son as Groot’s one-on-one aide came out to greet them and talk to Rocket as she escorted the two to Groot’s preschool class.

Rocket remembered that day. Groot loved his teachers and his aide helped him feel less of an outsider and more like a typical kid. But all of that changed when Groot was in the fifth grade and his aide had to retire because she just turned 65. Rocket remembered the emergency meeting that he had with Groot’s teachers, the school headmaster, the school guidance counselor, Groot’s case manager, the special education department and the school’s speech pathologist. Since Groot was only able to say “I am Groot.” He needed his aide because she was one of the very few people that studied Groot’s species’ language and could translate Groot’s thoughts to everyone else. The headmaster explained to Rocket that they tried to find a new aide for Groot, but since he was the last of his kind, that the need to study his language wasn’t necessary. The school only had 3 options for Groot: homeschool him until his high school graduation, place him in the special education classroom, or give him a communication device so that he could convey his thoughts, although he would sound like a robot to everybody.

Rocket knew that if he homeschooled Groot, the Xandar Department of Child Services would show up at the Guardians’ house faster than a bolt of lightning as soon as they got word that Rocket was teaching Groot how to build various weapons, bombs, and Death Buttons. Rocket didn’t want to place his son into the special education class because Groot was already getting teased because no one could understand him without his aide being present. If he were to be put in the special education class, the teasing would increase tenfold and it would lead to god knows what for Groot. Also, another problem with Groot being placed in the special education class would be the pace of the curriculum. Groot is one of the smartest students in the school and to put him in a class where he wouldn’t be academically interested or challenged would bore Groot to death.

So the only option was to have Groot use the communication device. At first he didn’t like it mainly because none of the voices sounded like him and they all sounded like a robot, which started the bullying of him by the other kids in the school. He still refused to use it even when his case manager and the school’s speech therapist allowed Groot to take the device home in the hopes that he would get used to it and be more apt to communicate through it. But that didn’t make Groot more inclined to use it, especially since he had Rocket at home to translate for him.

It’s Rocket’s hope that Groot will use his new communication device. Especially since Groot’s probability of getting his voice back was nonexistent. But, Groot seems to like his new voice synthesizer, especially since it sounds more like him and less like a robot.

There was one more scene. This was Groot’s latest birthday when he became a teenager. Groot has already started to exhibit the typical teenager behaviors of being moody and embarrassed by anything that his family did. Groot was sitting in a corner playing the portable video game that Rocket just gave him for his birthday. It wasn’t a big party, as Groot had no friends in school and the kids that the Guardians invited to his party refused to show up.

Gamora just brought out the double chocolate cake that she baked for Groot’s birthday, (his favorite type of cake) and Peter wrote “Happy Birthday Groot!” in green icing. They then brought it over to the table and Rocket got a reluctant and moody Groot up from where he was sitting and brought him over to the table as the Guardians sang “Happy Birthday” to Groot. Groot sat there with a bored expression on his face before he unceremoniously blew out the candles without much gusto before he got up and went to his room, bringing an end to the party.

Rocket then turned off the TV and went to bed. As he dreamed of raising Groot, he remembered all of the good times that he had with him, not the bad.

When he got up the next morning, he got the video tape out of the VCR and placed it in its case. He then put the case in his bag before he went to the nursing home. He decided to show Groot his saplinghood, both the good times and the bad times. Since Groot suffered severe memory loss, this was Rocket’s only chance to remind Groot of all of the things that he did before the accident. If Groot even remotely remembered anything, it was worth it to Rocket.

——————————————————————————————————

Read on Ao3 here.

——————————————————————————————————

@trashpandaorigins @madness-on-the-milano @mattchewystuff @rr4901 @whoop-whoop-grocket @thejollymilano @janetgenea @woozletania @vic394 @canuckscot @captain---rabbit @rocket-ringtail-raccoon @pineapple-crow

——————————————————————————————————

[electronic-therapy-teletherapy]

5 Habits of Successful Online Therapists

In this post, Diana Parafiniuk, MS,CCC-SLP, founder and chief marketing officer of E-Therapy, shares 5 telepractice insights from her years of experience. Developing these habits can help school-based speech therapists, occupational therapists, physical therapists, and guidance counselors that are new to online therapy have a successful telepractice.

Experience Practitioner Shares 5 Habits for Online Therapy

by Diana Parafiniuk

Telepractice has become the service-delivery model of my life’s work. I definitely dedicated sweat and tears—if not my blood—into building my own telepractice since 2008. I believe telepractice offers solutions and enhances the quality of life for underserved students.

Over these years, I learned that telepractice serves as a bridge and relationship-builder between students and clinicians. Many of our students and clients are digital natives, so remote sessions give us a chance to work with them using a form of communication they well understand.

During this COVID-19 pandemic, I wanted to share what I’ve learned about easing the online therapy process during my dozen years doing telepractice.

Be an excellent communicator

Clear, simple communication is one of the most important habits to develop for successful online therapy. Keep instructions concise, bullet information in emails, and send reminders for upcoming sessions. Keep a log of each communication with parents or colleagues.

If your telepractice platform doesn’t offer direct-communication log tracking, save and file your emails into separate folders for each client or student.

Set expectations at the start

Speech-language pathologists who use telepractice exclusively often make their introductions to families and/or school administrators and teachers initially over the phone. I coach my staff to make those first impressions with confidence, understanding, and a professional demeanor.

Take the time to learn what parents/teachers expect from online sessions. Offer examples of how you might work with their child or student. Let them know if and how they can—or should—participate with intervention, both during sessions and in daily life. Keep the child’s information in front of you so you can confirm with the teacher or parent what you’ll address during sessions.

Create consistent organization

Keep your digital files and hard-copy files organized. I try to keep this process easy to execute. E-Therapy and some other telepractice platforms include a way to create profiles for each client and store data. But you can create a system yourself.

Set up folders in a secure Google drive or cloud storage for your clinical data notes. Save the notes you take during sessions to the client file immediately after each session. You can also include links to activities you used to save time when you set up for your next session.

Schedule for success

Keep your session calendar updated. I find a digital calendar works best, and it is a habit that has served me well while practicing online therapy. It allows reminders and notifications to alert you about an upcoming session in various ways—text, email, pop-up—and with multiple timings. I also use them to send email reminders 24 hours before each session to parents or teachers. And keep your phone nearby in case a parent or teacher can’t get into a session and tries to call. If no one signs on for five minutes after the session is scheduled to begin, call the parent or teacher to minimize lost session time.

Ensure session privacy

Most platforms allow you to assign individual rooms or meeting appointments for each client to maintain privacy. You can adjust this for groups when needed. Assigning each parent or teacher a unique password also keeps sessions secure. Individually assigned rooms can track and digitally time-stamp your sessions as well. This log records what time the client or student arrived for the session, what time the SLP started the session, and how long both parties stayed in the session.

These fundamentals should help you set a sound foundation for your telepractice. Incorporating these tips into your practice also instills confidence in the parents and educators. When team members request items such as clinical data notes, contact log information, and proof of session attendance, these telepractice protocols can easily and effectively save time, show your professionalism, and support your practice.

This blog was first posted on: https://www.electronic-therapy.com/blog/5-habits-of-successful-online-therapy/

[businessarticlesclone]

What do speech therapists do?

Picking a Speech Therapist In Dubai is certifiably not a decision to play with. In this article, we separate a couple of critical considerations to help you track down the best speech therapist for you and your family. 

There are various reasons why families choose to get speech treatment. Some get a speech treatment reference from their PCP or pediatrician. Others proactively search for capable help in the wake of seeing their child endeavoring to pass on, showing erratic speech models, or waiting behind kids their age. 

Regardless, at whatever point you've made your decision it's an optimal chance to pick a speech-language pathologist (SLP) for you or your child. Picking the right speech therapist isn't by and large a basic decision, and various examinations should be thought of, including the possibility of the correspondence or swallowing issue, assurance of qualified therapists, your spending plan, arranging availability, and anything possible from that point. 

In this article, we will isolate unquestionably the main parts that should go into your dynamic communication. 

Components to Consider When Picking a Speech Therapist 

There are various extraordinary speech therapists out there. The key is to find one that is best for your family. Continuously end, you should feel sure that your speech therapist has the clinical inclination to improve correspondence results and someone that you can build a strong and trusting relationship with. 

Nature of Your Issue 

Speech treatment covers a wide degree of work, including speech and language issues, similarly as cordial correspondence, mental correspondence, and oral motor/dealing with and swallowing issues. While speech therapists can evaluate and treat a wide extent of ages and ends, it's basic to find one that is learned about your space of need. For example, a speech therapist who invested huge energy in early language acquiring among little children may not be available to work with a more settled post-stroke survivor who's experiencing a confined mental limit. 

As a relationship, imagine you expected to start taking guitar works out. Any guitar teacher could give fundamental direction to kick you off. Nevertheless, might you want to sort out some way to play old-style guitar? Electric? Blues? Jazz? Acoustic? R&B? Finding an instructor with comprehension and experience into your optimal style will help you every one of the more effectively pro the right scales and playing plans. 

While searching for a speech therapist, try to demand their confirmations, clinical strength, and experience treating clients with similar prerequisites. Here are some other huge requests to posture to a speech therapist before starting treatment.  Always tries to choose the child psychiatrist in Dubai, the best psychiatrist in Dubai, or the best psychologist in Dubai. Choosing the best can help your child more to build his best behavior. 

Your Ideal Setting  There are two principal settings that children get speech treatment: in their school or through a private practice. Each region enjoys its benefits and disservices. 

Speech treatment in a school is all things considered the most efficient other option and therapists enjoy the benefit of cooperating with an adolescent's teachers. Regardless, various schools are understaffed and under-resourced concerning speech treatment. This could mean wide work area work, broad reserve times, inconsistent plans on account of events, and specifically, a shortfall of modified, one-on-one direction. In light of the volume of young people requiring speech treatment at school, speech therapists now and again hold pack gatherings with various children, all with moving necessities and levels of ability. 

If you are unsatisfied with your school's other options or need to search for supplemental thought to also improve your child's progression, consider going to the private practice course. 

The potential gains of going to a private office are bountiful. For one, your youth will get the modified thought and support from your speech therapist, which will help them tailor rules depending upon your child's correspondence characteristics, insufficiencies, and goals. Second, while it will in general be difficult to sort out quality time with your speech therapist in a school setting, you can even more adequately cultivate strong parent-therapist associations and stay in close correspondence concerning your young person's progression. Ultimately, you have a more critical choice wherein speech therapist you choose to work with, simplifying it to find one that resolves your child's issues. 

The realities affirm that speech treatment in a private community is generally more expensive. On the off chance that you're adequately fortunate to have security, there is a chance your consideration could help invalidate or reduce these costs. Regardless, speech treatment is consistently denied by reinforcement plans for an enormous number of reasons (you can get comfortable with speech treatment insurance incorporation here). 

Finally, it's basic to understand that there are a couple of alternatives as opposed to public and private treatment. One model is close by colleges that have Speech and Hearing Divisions or offer speech treatment programs. This can be a way to deal with get assurance and treatment from an understudy pondering speech-language pathology, all under the oversight of an approved therapist. While this can be a fundamentally more moderate decision, one potential drawback is that your child may work with a program of turning understudies as they trade moves and graduate. 

On the web or Vis-à-vis  Not long ago, speech treatment required that clients and therapists were arranged inside a comparative room. Today, telehealth has changed the quantity of us get prosperity-related organizations, including speech treatment. 

From evaluation to the end to affirm-basedgetting treatment, online speech treatment works in like manner to ordinary, in-person care. The lone differentiation is that rather than sitting eye to eye in a comparable room, you're sitting opposite through video conferencing programming. Pick the best Counselling Dubai program for your youngster's future.

[northernstories]

Meet Hope Pintar, a speech, language and hearing sciences student from Ontonagon, Michigan. We asked Hope a few questions about her Wildcat experience so far: 

Why did you decide to come to NMU? 

Hope: Northern was always my top pick of a school. It was far enough away from home but also close enough. Marquette has the same characteristics of home and so much more. I am still on the water like at home and there are trees everywhere. In addition, some of my family went to Northern so I felt it was already in my blood. 

What do you like about your major at NMU? 

Hope: What isn’t there to like about it! My major can work in almost any setting with any age group, which is what I like most about it. I can work in a school or hospital with children or adults. The possibilities are endless and the ability to choose relieves a lot of stress when trying to decide a career path. NMU’s speech department also has a speech clinic, which many undergraduate programs do not have. With this, I feel like I am already ahead when entering graduate school. 

What's an example of a cool, interesting or helpful thing that you have done as a part of your major? 

Hope: There are a few things, the first being the service-learning activities we did in class. We went into a local preschool and did activities with them to help build phonological awareness. This year we will be conducting screenings at a local school, which not only helps educate us but also helps the speech pathologist at the school that would have otherwise conducted the screenings alone. 

Lastly, as part of the club associated with our major (NSSLHA), we partnered with PrimeTime Productions and brought comedian Drew Lynch to NMU. Drew Lynch, if you did not know, has a stutter which is something our major deals with often. So with this partnership, we could bring awareness to the disorder but also laugh along the way. 

What are you involved with on campus?

Hope: I am currently involved in many things on campus. The biggest is my work with NSSLHA. This entails being the President of the Northern Chapter of the National Students of Speech Language and Hearing Association. The second, is being the National NSSLHA Student State Officer of Michigan. This is a position I applied for which entails me guiding all the NSSLHA chapters in Michigan with anything they need and keeping in contact with all the officers in my region and the nation! 

I am also in the Student Leader Fellowship Program (SLFP). This will be the start of my second year, where I will be working on my CSI as a Girl Scout Troop Leader. I am also a member of Mortar Board Telion Chapter. Lastly, I have recently begun working in the Center for Student Enrichment (CSE) in the Superior Edge/ Volunteer Center as a Volunteer Coordinator.  

Of your activities on- or off-campus, what has been the most rewarding and why? 

Hope: The most rewarding has to be attending the 2019 MSHA Conference in East Lansing, MI. This helped me discover what exactly I wanted to focus on in my field. This opportunity was available because of the hard work of our department and students. We work hard to get funding and give everyone the opportunity to attend. I learned so much about my future field and all the new research being conducted. I hope to be able to attend again this year as well. 

What's your favorite memory during your time as a student? 

Hope: My favorite memory as a student will have to my sophomore year when Al Roker came to campus to break the world record of the largest game of freeze tag. I think back to waking up at 5am, so excited to get in line. I then remember sitting on the field waiting in anticipation for the game to begin. I remember trying to get on TV any way possible and trying to get as close to Al as I could. When finally we got to playing the game, I ended up rolling my ankle. I ended up wanting to be frozen because I could not run. Either way, I will leave NMU with a degree in one hand and the camo bandana that represented my freeze tag team in the other. 

Further comments about your NMU experience?

Hope: Northern helped me discover who I am and what I want to be. Without NMU’s help, I am not sure where my path would have lead. I am sad to think about my time being a Wildcat ending in May, but because of NMU, my future is so bright. With that being said, all I can say is thank you!

[harryandmeghan0-blog]

Why Meghan Markle's accent seems to have changed overnight.

New Post has been published on http://harryandmeghan.xyz/why-meghan-markles-accent-seems-to-have-changed-overnight/

Why Meghan Markle's accent seems to have changed overnight.

Let’s start this article with an anecdote: Josh Thomas.

It might seem a bit odd to kick off a discussion about the Duchess of Sussex by looking at the life of a 31-year-old Aussie comedian, but stay with me.

I would forgive you for thinking Josh grew up in Europe. Given the comic’s slightly British, slightly Welsh accent, that’s probably what most people believe. Only that’s not the case at all.

Despite sounding like he grew up across the world, Josh was born in Melbourne and raised in Brisbane, rendering his accent something of a quirky mystery.

My sister Claire and I saw Josh in a Melbourne Comedy Festival show about five years ago, where he explained the strange reality: he had only travelled around Europe for a handful of months and, almost overnight, adopted his unique and endearing twang. It’s stuck ever since.

I remember returning to our speech pathologist mother at the end of the night who assured us that, yes, accents can be very fickle things.

Which makes it rather irksome that so many people are giving Meghan Markle a tough time this weekend, after a video circulated on Twitter showing her greeting fans with a slight British accent.

Advertisement

Despite only moving to live with her now-husband Harry in November last year, it’s apparent that Meghan sounds rather different from what she did in her Suits days.

Check out her new accent below:

Commentary around Meghan’s new accent has been rather nasty – and the acidic comments will not be repeated here – but it does raise the question: Why are some people’s accents so malleable when others’ are impenetrable?

Here are some of the potential explanations:

1. The chameleon effect

Those whose accents change quickly may simply be ‘unintentionally mirroring’ the very people they seek to make comfortable.

Subconsciously mimicking someone’s behaviour – whether it be body language, an accent, or slang – is embedded in the human brain’s “mirror neurons“, which work to make sure our interactions ‘fit in’ with the context we’re in.

We all have mirror neurons, and, even if you don’t notice it, the way you speak and behave will likely be different depending on the cultural and social setting.

2. Empathy

While some consider a wandering accent a sign of being disingenuine, it’s actually the opposite.

According to this article in The Telegraph, 2010, it’s a sign of genuine kindness:

Scientists from the University of California, Riverside, found the subconscious copying of an accent comes from an inbuilt urge of the brain to “empathise and affiliate”.

… “Whether we are hearing or lip-reading speech articulations, a talker’s speaking style has subtle influences on our own manner of speaking,” Prof Rosenblum said.

“This unintentional imitation could serve as social glue, helping us to affiliate and empathise with each other.”

3. She’s particularly musical

Now, this one is pure speculation, but it is possible that Meghan’s accent has changed because her brain’s “musicality” is higher than the average person’s.

You might have noticed musicians like Rihanna and Madonna have ever-changing accents depending on the country they’re interviewed in, or fellow singers they appear alongside, and that is believed to boil down to the skill-set a musician masters, and how this overlaps with speech. Studies show musicians are mostly adept language learners, and this could indeed extend to their tendency to mirror the inflections and lilts of those who surround them.

Whether or not this applies to Meghan is unclear; while she shone in high school musicals, it’s tenuous to suggest she is a musical genius or particularly musically gifted.

No matter the reason, next time you giggle at someone’s flip-flopping accent, remember: They’re probably just really kind, trying to make you feel comfortable, or a borderline musical genius.

[ndrmag]

Contributor Interview with Elizabeth Taddonio

Bio: Elizabeth Taddonio is a speech therapist living in Athens, GA with her husband, two dogs, and (pretty soon) their baby (untitled, forthcoming April 2017). Her chapbook, Stone Boats, is available from Spooky Girlfriend Press and you can read some of her thoughts at tinyletter.com/yrfriendliz. 

What’s your favorite swear word or insult?

"Take a hike, PAL!"

My best friend used to call people "drips" when we were in high school (e.g., "Oh that guy? That guy's a drip.") and I loved that. I can't use it as well as she does.

What do you do for money? Feel free to list all the day jobs you’ve ever had.

I'm a speech-language pathologist. During the week I work full time in an elementary school, and I work in the acute care setting at our local community hospital on weekends and holidays. I've worked a lot of jobs and this is my second career but it is, to me, the best job in the world.

When did you first start thinking of yourself as a writer or poet? 

Oh I've been writing compulsively forever. I started to identify as a writer in college when people I didn't know would send me criticism or praise for the stuff I would publish in our paper or in our alt magazine. Also honestly being around so many other writers in my journalism classes or otherwise helped with that confidence to say "yes this is just what I do."

Has writing or research ever led you into a weird situation? If so, do describe.

Before I working as a speech therapist I worked full time in online market research, so I talked to the public A LOT. One time I did some research for a fast food chain and a woman's answer to a question about a menu item was literally just, "too many diseases, not enough cures" and I think about that a lot. I don't know, I have a real high tolerance for weird and I hope it stays that way. I met my husband while I was getting a masters in comm studies and he was getting his MFA and all the people in that program were lunatics. Our friend pulled a raw deer heart out of his backpack at a bar once and ate it like it was an apple, but even that just feels kind of heady. Who's to SAY?

What’s the worst advice anyone ever gave you about your writing or otherwise?

In a journalism class I took my freshman year of college, a professor quoted someone who said "the good stuff sticks" (does anyone know who said this?) and I love the sentiment of it but it's not true. My brain has a lot to deal with! I need help every now and then and when I hear a good sentence in my head I need t write it down. Or if I get a joke just right, you have to write it down to preserve the wording. I riff a lot with friends and am constantly taking notes on phrasing because it really matters. Being pregnant, my memory is just awful. Also, when you're pregnant people want to give you a lot of advice so I try to just kind of listen and be kind. I like advice, it's people opening up about what has been important to them and most of the time it's not actually about you at all. We are all just doing our best.

What’s the quickest way to get you to lose interest in a story or book?

Arrogant men talking about it.

What were you listening to when you wrote this?

I filled most of this out at work in my speech room and it was really quiet cause the kids were at lunch! But I can always hear the kids up and down the halls and the teachers telling them to walk please. 

[newstwitter-blog]

New Post has been published on News Twitter

New Post has been published on http://www.news-twitter.com/2017/03/20/washington-post-what-hasbros-pie-face-signals-about-the-future-of-fun-33/

Washington Post: What Hasbro’s Pie Face signals about the future of fun

Luca Kim watches as his dad, Eric Kim, plays Pie Face.

When K.C. Miller got her seven grandchildren together for the holidays, things got a little messy in the kitchen.

They weren’t cooking some elaborate recipe: They were playing Pie Face, a game in which a dollop of whipped cream is served up from a plastic “throwing arm” to someone who has positioned his face in its path. As everyone tried to remain stoic while getting bopped with a white blob, Miller took photos and videos on her iPhone.

“We’d play these videos and we’d just howl at how funny they were,” said Miller, a 62-year-old resident of Gilbert, Ariz. And then she posted some of them on Facebook, wanting to share the hijinks with others.

Pie Face, made by Hasbro, was the single best-selling item in the games category in 2016 and the fourth best-selling toy overall, according to market research firm NPD Group. And Miller was hardly alone in sharing her family’s laughs online: Hasbro’s customer research found that over 50 percent of people who buy Pie Face make and share a video of themselves playing it.

Pie Face is a game created by Hasbro. (Instagram @purple_gem)

Pie Face is a symbol of a new era in toymaking, one in which social media is allowing the industry to marshal you, the everyday shopper, to become a product’s most powerful advertiser. And its mega-popularity has helped fuel a flurry of action from toymakers to create games that offer a “shareable moment” — a brief visual morsel that parents and grandparents will post on Instagram or Facebook and that teens will put on Snapchat or YouTube.

It’s a new breed of toy that can’t just be fun for players in real time. It has to be demonstrative. Performative, even.

Jace Raymond Holm, 2, of Scappoose, Ore.

Annie Miller, 8, of Black Forest, Colo., reacts.

Doc Nguyen of Lynnwood, Washington plays the game Pie Face.

Kelly Stearns, a Speech Language Pathologist Assistant for Gwinnett County Public Schools, plays the game Pie Face in front of her students in Snellville, Ga.

The desire to strike social gold is shaping the game business in a variety of ways: Toymakers are mining viral social clips for inspiration for new products. They are scrambling to crank out new games faster than ever to ride digital waves before they crest. And they are approaching their marketing campaigns differently, knowing that your shared clips might do a fair amount of the lifting.

Pie Face, in fact, first came on Hasbro’s radar thanks to social sharing. In 2015, the team there spotted a viral clip of a grandfather and grandson playing the game, which was originally produced in limited numbers by a small company in Britain. Hasbro moved aggressively to buy the rights to manufacture and distribute the game.

Other companies, too, are looking to social phenomena for cues. This summer, Buffalo Games & Puzzles is set to release a game called Flip Tricks, a riff on the cadre of “bottle flip challenge” videos that have sprung up on YouTube. In the clips, people toss plastic bottles in the air, trying to make them somersault midflight but land right side up. Flip Tricks attempts to codify the phenomenon a bit, providing more durable bottles and spelling out head-to-head or solo challenges.

“If something’s already gone viral, and you’re building a product around that, then you already have this built-in marketing that is stronger than any traditional advertising,” said Ben Jamesson, a vice president at Buffalo Games.

Social trends go boom and bust at warp speed, and so toymakers say that they have to move at a breakneck pace to capitalize on them. Such was the case with Speak Out, another Hasbro creation. In this game, players wear a mouthguard-like plastic mold that stretches their faces to look cartoonish and makes it hard to talk. Players must say a phrase to a partner and get them to guess their garbled words.

Two new games come with mouth pieces that distort what the player is saying. Other players must guess what the phrase is correctly to win. (Instagram @imtrilldevin, @aida_sofia_delvecchio, @nickcalaway)

Hasbro typically takes 12 to 18 months to conceptualize and manufacture a game from scratch. With Speak Out, the process was compressed to 11 weeks. The idea for it was sparked by Web videos of people putting in dental mouthpieces and getting the giggles when they tried to speak clearly, and Hasbro didn’t want to be late to the social-sharing party.

“Everything has changed. The mind-set is the biggest thing — we have to act like entrepreneurs,” said Jonathan Berkowitz, senior vice president of Hasbro Gaming. “We just have to run when we see an opportunity.”

Laykin Johnson, 2, left, of Roy, Utah and Brighton Polson, 5, of Round Rock, Texas, play the game Pie Face. (Jennifer Polson)

Making a game into an Instagram or Facebook lodestone doesn’t necessarily mean the idea for it starts on social media.

Josh Loerzel, vice president of sales and marketing at Zing Toys, says there’s a particular aesthetic that lends itself to a grabby, share-worthy bit: There’s got to be some “visual eye candy,” Loerzel said, and a goofy sense of humor.

A Zing product called Wet Head is an example of this: In the game, one player wears a yellow helmet equipped with a water chamber. Others take turns pulling pegs out of the helmet, and eventually, one of those pulls ends up soaking the wearer with water.

To play “Wet Head���, players put a plastic helmet on their head and remove pegs until water is released randomly. (Instagram @hannahisntreal, @jenny360, @mandybarlow4)

A version of the game was released about a decade ago, but was sent to the dustbin because it didn’t catch on. But when Zing acquired the company that originally made it, executives decided to revive it, betting it would take off this time thanks to social media sharing. They’ve now sold over a million of them in North America.

“You look really funny with the hat on,” Loerzel said. “And then there’s that reaction moment when you get wet and everyone’s laughing at you. It’s really funny to watch.”

Hasbro is counting on similar, social-friendly laughs with Egged On, a game to be released later this year in which players take a set of rubberized eggs and fill some of them with water. You take turns breaking them on your head, and eventually, someone gets soaked.

Juli Lennett, toy industry analyst at NPD Group, says toymakers are smart to capitalize on a shopper mind-set that her firm is seeing apply to a variety of consumer goods.

“The way we look at it is that, enabled by social media, today’s consumer doesn’t want to follow the stars — she wants to BE a star,” Lennett said in an email. “He doesn’t covet status brands — he wants to build HIS OWN brand.”

Put another way: We want an approving audience for whatever we’re doing.

That is why toymakers are not just thinking about how these principles apply specifically to games, but to a wide variety of products. Take Stikbots, a line of brightly-colored, plastic stick people made by Zing that are designed to be the stars of homemade stop-motion animation videos. Stikbots cost about $5, and a related app enables kids to make short movies with the figures that can be posted on Instagram or YouTube.

Stikbot is a toy that helps players create short, stop-motion animations and share them online. (Stikbot)

“It connects to the core of where kids are today,” Loerzel said. “Back in the day, I’d get a new pair of Nike Jordans to look cool and get people liking me at school. Now it’s, ‘I want to post cool stuff on YouTube.’ ”

At Zing’s headquarters, executives have moved out of their offices to convert those spaces into tiny movie studios. They’ve hired 15 people — stop-motion animators, video editors and others — to feed the social media beast with new content.

If they want kids to share their own videos, they theorize, there’s got to be a rich well of content out there carrying the Stikbots hashtag. And there’s got to be a reason to share: Stikbots scours YouTube and Facebook for these posts each day, and reposts especially strong ones.

“They’re becoming the advertisers for us,” Loerzel said. “It gets them likes, it gets them follows. And it just raises the awareness of the product.”

And that means Zing can think differently about marketing these products: With Stikbots, it is moving away from TV advertising in the United States to an entirely digital campaign. Buffalo Games, too, said that it might allocate a marketing budget quite differently for a social-inspired game such as Flip Tricks or Watch Ya Mouth, a game from Buffalo similar to Speak Out.

“Once these things really go viral and hit that tipping point,” Jamesson said, “you may be better off not spending that money on anything traditional.”

Read more:

No, the rest of America is not online shopping like you are

The soup business has grown cold. Inside Campbell’s plan to turn up the heat.

This post has been harvested from the source link, and News-Twitter has no responsibility on its content. Source link

[cynthiadshaw]

#LadyBoss: redefining what a boss looks like

Too many of us grew up only seeing one kind of boss or leader in the media. The lack of representation for other groups reinforced harmful stereotypes and acted as a self-fulfilling prophesy, but would our opinion of what a leader looks like be different if the media did a better job at representing the true diversity of leadership in America?

Women and other under-represented groups are already leading many great companies, organizations, & academic institutions; others are authoring best-sellers, building engaged audiences, leading movements and more.

We had the honor of connecting with many of the best and brightest female leaders from in and around the city and we asked them our question of the month: What is the best advice you have for someone who feels like they are facing insurmountable odds.

We encourage you to check out the female leaders we’ve highlighted below, follow them on social media if you find their work or story interesting and most importantly do your part to #fightstereotypes

Emily Hood | Recipe Developer | Food Blogger and Social Worker

While I have faced challenges in my life, there are many other people who have faced things more challenging than I can possibly imagine. On social media and my blog, I am a recipe developer/food blogger, sharing healthy and Whole30/paleo focused recipes with my community. However, the rest of the time I am a School Social Worker, and I have the opportunity to work with students and families who face challenges that truly do seem insurmountable. Some of the students I work with have an incredible amount of resilience and strength, and it is part of what helps them through their daily challenges. While I am may not an expert on how to face challenges, I am honored to be able to work alongside the students, parents, and families that trust me with theirs. They allow me to walk alongside them, listen to their struggles and pain, and try to problem solve where to go next. So my best advice? Find a listening ear, a family member or friend, a counselor or therapist – going through a challenge that feels too big to handle will feel much more manageable if you can do it alongside someone you trust.

theprimitiveplate.com  @theprimitiveplate pinterest.com/theprimitiveplate @theprimitiveplate @primitiveplate

Jennifer G. Thompson | Artist | Educator | MFA Candidate

I think the best advice I have for someone who is facing a challenge that seems insurmountable, is to write down what your challenge is. Then, break it down into achievable steps and do your best to check each one off. It may seem hard, but please don’t forget to ask for help, take time for yourself and pray everyday. I know in life we all will face insurmountable challenges but you are going to make it to the other side victoriously. I believe in you. Believe in yourself.

jennifergthompson.com @tx_fad @_jennifergthompson_

Alleah Austin | Hairstylist + Makeup Artist

My advice would be to embrace the challenges in life, no matter how big or small. I think a lot of times when things get rough, human nature makes us want to give up. But I truly believe a lot of hard work and failure is behind most success stories. Challenging times are inevitable, but if you change your outlook and look at your challenges as an opportunity, your outcome can change.

@alleahaustinbeauty alleahaustinbeauty.glossgenius.com

Samantha Bedgood | Cookie Artist

My biggest piece of advice for someone facing a challenge that feels insurmountable is to ask for help! Find the people that love and support you and lean on them when you need it. They may have a solution or perspective that you wouldn’t have come up with on your own!

ohtastebakery.com @ohtastebakery

Angel Morris | Journalist by day, bargain hunter all the time

Consider your resources. Do you have family, friends, colleagues, acquaintances who can assist in any way? Are there groups in your community to whom you can reach out? Whether it’s a personal goal or an actual need you have, there is often someone in your circle who can help if you’re just willing to ask. We’re all put on this earth to ease one another’s burdens, in fact. Let others aid you however they can, then turn around and support the person behind you!

lifeonclearance.net/lessons-from-the-thrift-store @lifeonclearance @lifeonclearance

Hannah Kingsolver | Photographer and Bank Teller

It’s cliche to say, but everyone needs to hear it at some point or another… NEVER GIVE UP. Some people need to be reminded more than others that when there is a set back, you find a way to overcome it. Life is the BEST thrower of curve balls, and wow… you may strike out over and over again, but that’s life. YOU have the power to choose what your next steps should be. Set small goals for yourself until they become bigger and bigger, and when you’ve made it, reach higher. Just NEVER stop trying because if you do, you’ve already lost. Improvising and adaptability is key to over coming insurmountable issues, and it starts with your mind set. Just know that whatever problems you may have, there will always be a way to solve them if you are willing to improvise and adapt to those curve balls. You got this, and there are people out there who believe in you!

@svmragi  hannahkingsolver.com

Davelyn Davenport | Personal Trainer & Mental Health Advocate

The best advice I would give is first shift your mindset. Within any challenge you are facing a positive mindset will propel you over the mountain when you thought there was absolutely no way you were going to scale it. Going into anything with the mindset of defeat guarantees you a loss before you even step on the battlefield. You have to be able to visualize yourself winning. Manifest it! Our minds are so powerful and we wield everything, positive or negative, upon our lives. So speak and think all things positive. It starts in the mind. The second piece of advice I would give is to stop forward looking. We are a generation of forward thinkers that we get so anxious for what’s to come before we barely began to crawl. Remain in the present and work on taking the action steps, small or large, before you deem something over or out of your reach. The last piece of information, and to me ties all these together, is change your environment! If you are constantly submerged in a negative space, with negative minded people & energies (this goes for what content you follow on socials as well), nothing positive can flourish. You become a product of that space. Find positive groups, whether online or in your community, and allow that positive energy to radiate within your soul. Free yourself from negativity and no challenge that you come across will ever feel insurmountable again!

motiv2fit.com @davelyn__  @Motiv2fit

Marilu Villegas | Photographer

Marilu Villegas

Put God first in all of your projects, never give up your goal, your never ending dream. But give up your fear, your “can’t”s, and the excuses.  Do not place limits on your mind and never stop seeking knowledge. Be diligent that nothing and no one will put out your fire or your vision of the things you want to accomplish. Keep persevering and set your sights on the goal, clinging to and embracing with all your strength what you want to achieve.

@mariluvillegass

Alondra Islas | HairArtist

I would tell them , to never give up or loose hope. You will always be your own worse critics but at the end of the day you are capable of doing a lot more than what you think you are! Nothing is too much of a challenge as long as you are determined!

@_amazingalondra

Alex | Marathon runner | Student & Barista

When facing something I feel is insurmountable, I always take a step back and detach from the situation at hand. I look at every possible outcome and possibility, then immediately take action. Is there something I can do NOW to get me further to a positive outcome? If so, then I begin planning and taking the steps needed to tackle the challenge. Don’t talk about it, be about it; anything is possible when you take control by actively working for what you want. On the other hand, if there is nothing immediate to be done, I may be frustrated, but there is no reason to waste precious energy worrying about situations out of my control. Bottom line? Detach, plan, and take action.

@alexgonzalezxo

Nicole DeVoss | Speech Language Pathologist with a specialization in social learning

Amy Theriot Photograpghy

We all go through periods of our lives where we feel we are facing challenges that are insurmountable.  My advice is to take a step back and not let yourself be defined by the problem.  Obstacles in life exists, so we can either resist them or accept the reality that they are in front of us.  I love using the analogy of ocean waves when thinking of challenging times in my life.  I can either try to fight off the wave (which would be futile) or accept the wave and let it wash past me.  Once I have that perspective, it helps me realize that challenges are part of life.  Don’t think “why is this happening to me?” but instead flip the script and think “what can I learn from this?

thecommunicationclubhouse.com @thecommunicationclubhouse

Stephanie | Photographer | artist and model

It is something I have to tell myself a lot as well because having anxiety and running your own business that isn’t always where you want it to be, you just have to tell yourself when you think you are going through hell, keep going cause who stops at hell. Things may not be how you want it at the moment but you just have to keep pushing through it and work through your problems, don’t just quit because it got hard.

RusticBPhotography.com @rusticbphotography @rusticbphotography

Sara Price | Sales Consultant | Photographer

When faced with a difficult challenge the best advice I can give is to trust your gut! Its amazing to receiving constant support and advice from everyone but at the end of the day your the one in control. You know your own limits and strengths, never be afraid to lean on them. Continue to have faith in your decisions and remember it’s not the end of the world!

@sara__price

Nnedimma |  Singer | songwriter & Medical Student

@steezmedia

The best advice I can give is to believe in yourself and have faith.  Work indefatigably to fulfill your goals and always be intentional with your actions. Even in the face of adversity, you can succeed.

fanlink.to/HoldOnMebyNnedimma @godivah_ fanlink.to/LoveAgainNnedimma

Brenda Armendariz | Personal Trainer

Erase the words “ I can’t “ From your vocabulary. And replace it with “ How can I “ Words are powerful, and if you train your mind believe in yourself anything is possible!

@Bfit_tx

Chelsea Paterson | Personal Blogger & Teacher

@baileylivphoto

When the problems of the world overwhelm you, it’s such a gift to know that there is no problem you face the God doesn’t know or fails to understand. Finding reasons for our struggles might help us understand them, but even when our circumstances don’t make sense, trust in God’s greater plan. “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take hear! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33 “And we know that in all things God worlds for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28

classyconfident.com @classy.confident.chelbell 

Anastacia Sadeh | Mother | Friend | Artist

Feeling like we have met a challenge that is insurmountable is hard. Really hard. These are the moments when our hope snaps like a bone breaking from too much unnatural weight. It sounds like a sickening crack in our emotional mind. It is in those moments when something as hard-wired as breathing often turns into a dare. We have all been present for these miserable moments. And we must understand we can get through them. It isn’t what we face that is usually as insurmountable as the unrealized blinders we subconsciously wear, born of surviving previous chapters of our lives. These blinders block our vision and thus our abilities to push forward into unfamiliar territories that demand new emotional ‘default settings’. Being still long enough to acknowledge our tumultuous feelings is the first step to moving through the challenge. When these types of challenges hit me, I must often force myself to lean into my faith until my mind can slow down. I then re-conceptualize the situation’s parts into smaller and more attainable pieces. I have learned that leaning into my faith gives me the courage to ascertain what parts of the crisis I can change and what parts I cannot. It more often than not leads me to reach out to trusted friends for support. The vulnerability it takes to do that is not always easy, but humanity’s mutual need for authentic connection is strengthened through sharing our truths. I can remember once seeing a bird fly desperately around the ceiling of a grocery store when I was a child young enough to still reach up for my mother’s hand. To my surprise most people there that day chose to ignore its frantic flight and go about their checklists. I felt very sorry for it. I didn’t realize that the adults around me didn’t possess any better tools to free it than I did despite their age. No one knew what to do with it, so they ignored it. Our feelings surrounding crisis are often like that frantic bird. They fly around in a panic from being trapped and then are ignored for lack of better options. Had someone trusted in their ability to find a solution, they might have acted on it. Had they acted on it, they might have caught it. And If they caught it, they could have then freed it. The insurmountable events of our lives are all made up of parts. I try to be still. I try to focus on where my faith brings me that day. I do what I can with each smaller part of the whole and then I hand the other over to God. When I have done those things, then I go on with my day and do my best to be present for it. Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither are solutions for seemingly insurmountable challenges. They are, however, chances to better understand ourselves, our faiths, and our purpose.

AnastaciaSadeh.com @sadehstudioarts

Lisa Willis | Jewelry Designer

The best advice I could give to someone in this situation is to trust in their own power and also trust that the Universe will bring out strengths in them that they didn’t know they had. When you’re faced with a challenge there’s only two options; to deal with it or to run away. Imagine how much more pain you will feel if you just give up. If you at least try to overcome any challenge in life, even if you ultimately fail, knowing that you tried is a source of pride. The resiliency of a determined spirit is unmatched.

@makesmalltalk

Ashton Little | Bar Method Fitness instructor & Dance Teacher/Choreographer

Life is full of tests, trials, & challenging seasons. I used to think that the goal was to live a “comfortable” life. What a naive thought! My best advice would be to live in the present moment and shift your focus to the creator instead of mountain in front of you.( it is tough to do.)  Meditate on whatever is good, noble, authentic, & just. EVERYTHING starts in the mind  & life and death lie in the power of your tongue. Speak life & choose to persevere. It IS a choice,. Some days are victorious, and other days may feel like you are taking several steps back. It is okay to fall apart, but its never okay to quit running the race!

@ashtontorreslittle_

Corina Garza | Makeup Artist & Business Woman

Set goals! Take one day at a time, also be teachable and always do your own research. Learn from your mistakes and keep positive attitude.

@Corinagcosmetics_  makeupbycorinag.com

Madeleine Glenski | Copywriter

When something seems totally unachievable or completely out of reach – whether it be a task, a goal, a life-long dream, etc. – I’ve found that it helps to determine steps it would take to achieve it and focus on those individual steps rather than the end goal. For example, it can be overwhelming to think about becoming fluent in a second language, but determining and achieving small steps to eventually get there, such as watching a movie in that language or signing up for a one-time class, doesn’t seem so daunting. When I take this approach, I make actual progress toward my goals rather than waste time thinking about how out of reach they may feel.

madeleineglenski.com @mad_L_N

Sammi Stalker | Fitness Enthusiast

@virza_images

The best advice I have for someone who is facing a challenge they feel is insurmountable is that when you think you can’t, you most positively can. Mindset is everything. If you mentally tell yourself that whatever challenges you are facing are impossible to overcome, then you are not even giving yourself a fair chance to prove yourself wrong. You need to walk into any given situation, good or bad, with a positive mindset that you can overcome anything! I promise you that it is worth it, it is always worth it. There may be things you come across that feel like the end of the world, but it will pass and you will get through it. You will walk out of every challenging situation stronger than you were before. You just have to find the strength on a daily basis to believe in yourself!

@sammi.fit

Maria Eleanor Liceralde | Licensed Esthetician & Phi Brows Microblading Artist

When facing what seems to be an insurmountable challenge it’s always important to remain positive in order to develop and create solutions. Visualize your goals, take risks, be persistent, stay strong, and be true to yourself. No matter what life throws at you, never give up! Work hard, be positive, and this too shall pass.

valenciabrows.com @Valenciabrows @mariaeleanor.liceralde.5

Ciara Martinez | Health and lifestyle coach

My advice for this is to get up everyday and focus on what you can do THAT DAY to make it the best possible. Don’t dwell on what went wrong or how you messed up yesterday. Work hard and be consistent and you can change anything about your life that isn’t satisfying you:)

@ketogoddessmama

Mariam Rehan | Makeup Artist

I would suggest people to keep yourself abreast with the latest trends and changes so that you can quickly adapt to your environment and just practice, practice and practice so that you can be the best version of yourself and can handle any challenges head on. Lastly, don’t ever give up no matter what and always look on the brighter side of things!

@everviewbeauty @everview01

Blown by gaby | ombre specialist

I’ve been in this industry for over 7 years and I was very discouraged in the beginning it took me a good 5 years to be comfortable and confident in my industry. Hard work pays off gaining the right clientele takes time. Be patient with yourself and give yourself room and time to grow.

@blownbygaby

Belen Gomez | Hairstylist & Makeup Artist

The best advice I can give , sounds very cliche , but to keep pushing through the rough times. Honestly at the end it will only be you living YOUR dream. Things happen in life but you will always have to look at the bright side, it may take a couple days , weeks but it takes many wrongs to get to your right. With door closing new ones will open and it’ll be one of the best things that could happen and lead to more greater success!

@beautybyblen

Sabrina Rae Santoro | Copywriter | Social Media Marketing Strategist

Life works in interesting ways sometimes, the truth is, you won’t ever be given a situation you aren’t strong enough to get through. The bigger the challenge the more rewarding the results will be. Remember, diamonds are made under pressure. Keep going.

sabrinaraesantoro.com

Tracey Mitchell | Published Author + International Speaker

Pain is no respector of persons. We could swap stories on how we’ve fallen apart during life’s darketst moments. But I’ve learned we lose ground when we bury our hearts in our insecurities or take cover beneath the security blanket of denial. Refusal to face greatest challenges does not dissipate the storms; rather, it empowers them. A victorious life is not stumbled upon; it is cultivated. It’s the result of choosing to be bold, brave -fearless-when everything in you wants to cower in defeat. If you are serious about defeating the things that seek to destroy you, you must decide to be fabulously fierce and face your problems head-on. Ask yourself the difficult questions: – Am I willing to trade my best days for a life spend wallowing in the pit of unrealized expectations? – Will I permit the claws of injustice to strip me of my God-appointed destiny? – Will I enthrone feelings of loss, empowering them to steal my peace? – Will I wast my life grieving over those times when I was blindsided by hurtful situations? You don’t have to agree to any of these things, but is your choice. I challenge you to bypass the quicksand of self-defeatism. Reach deep inside and find your brave heart.

traceymitchell.com @traceymitchell  @traceymitchell1

Christina Nguyen | Nonprofit Marketing Expert & Entrepreneur

There’s a saying that I often tell myself and to others, “The universe only gives you what you can handle.” The more challenging the situation life gives you, it’s because you’re meant for greater things and this can be applied in work, school, family, relationships, etc. As a survivor of sexual assault and subject to gender and racial discrimination, I know what it is like to feel as if there are no solutions or way out of the darkness. It is through voice and expressing our challenges together that makes us better, stronger, and human. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. And more importantly, don’t be afraid of greatness. Also, sometimes all you need are carbs and a shoulder to lean on as a starter kit 🙂

AscendNorthTexas.org @AscendNorthTexas @AscendNorthTexas linkedin.com/groups/2076745 @christinapnguyen @christinapnguyen_ linkedin.com/in/christinapnguyen

Nikki Pecoraro | Dallas Wedding Photographer | H&N Photography

Don’t ever give up. I know, sounds cliche but it’s for real. Challenges feel insurmountable because it’s asking for more of us than we know is there. It requires us to unlock what is there but we don’t necessarily know it yet. When we face those challenges (knowing that giving up isn’t an option) we find ourselves learning and growing so much from those challenges that we once thought we would never overcome. It’s in you. You have the ability and the means even if you don’t know it yet. We’ve found that those challenges we once thought were crazy have turned out to be the challenges we are most thankful for because it has grown us, stretched us, and equipped us for the next part of our journey. Challenges build character, build confidence, and build creativity. Welcome the challenge and never give up.

HandNphotography.com  @h_nphotos @handnphotos

Nicole Myers | AdTech Associate & Aspiring Girlboss

Breathe. The first and best piece of advice is to simply breathe. Every day is a fresh start with new possibilities and things to be grateful for. Often, I find situations can feel insurmountable because we focus and get too entrenched in the big picture leaving us completely overwhelmed. Personally, I have been there several times. Wake up challenging yourself to find the positive in at least one aspect of life. Remind yourself of where you have come from and the strong capable human that you are now. Begin to parse the situation down into smaller manageable pieces or steps. Just take it day by day. Build confidence in who you are by taking on this challenge head first. Soon enough you will be on the other side and stronger for it.

@blondeamor

The post #LadyBoss: redefining what a boss looks like appeared first on Voyage Dallas Magazine | Dallas City Guide.

source http://voyagedallas.com/2019/08/06/girlboss-redefining-boss-looks-like-2/

[electronic-therapy-teletherapy]

Start Your Own Telepractice Or Join A Teletherapy Company?

After the stressful year and a half that educators had due to Covid-19, many therapists are entering summer break with an introspective look at their lives and careers. Teletherapy may not have been a choice before, but after school closures and a hit to their mental health and wellbeing, school-based therapists are making a choice to start their own telepractice or join a teletherapy company like E-Therapy.

Teletherapy is a great way for speech language pathologists, physical and occupational therapists, and mental health professionals to gain experience, refresh their careers, manage their own schedule, and work with students from all over the country. It can also be a fantastic way to build more income, especially if you live in a remote area without many opportunities. But first you need to decide whether you want to start your own teletherapy practice or work for a teletherapy company.

How do you get started in teletherapy, and what you will need?

The process is relatively simple and very similar to getting started in any setting, with a few key pieces that help you to take your therapy practice online.

Start a teletherapy practice or join a company?

Something to consider when getting started in teletherapy is how you will receive and take on referrals for clients and students. You can venture out on your own as a private practice or you can work with an established teletherapy company. Either way has its benefits and risks.

Start your own teletherapy practice

Venturing out on your own means you are responsible for all licensing, insurance, tax, marketing, billing, and building a client list, plus bunches of other small-business and compliance related things. It takes a lot of leg work, but fortunately there are many agencies and organizations that help people establish their own small business. Browse this checklist of things to do to start your business. If it exhausts you just reading through the list, then it may be too much for you now.

Licensure

An important factor in telepractice, your own or if you are with a teletherapy company, is licensure. Since you are online, you do not have geographical boundaries, but you must be licensed in the states your students are located. It is not difficult, just another step in building your business. You don’t need to do it all at once either, so start where you are, and add on as needed. ASHA has a state-by-state list of contacts and licensure information.

Technology

You are also responsible for your own technology. Teletherapy is built on video-conferencing tech. Happily, there are many popular video conferencing platforms out there –  Zoom, GoToMeeting, even Facebook Live. Choose one that you are comfortable using, then learn it well, so if anything goes wrong during a live session, you won’t panic. Don’t forget security and privacy issues when researching which platform to go with!

Paperwork

Once you get the credentials and physical setup complete, you will need to learn to handle the never-ending paperwork. It could be a myriad of things from progress reports, to IEP meeting notes, billing cycles,  and therapy plans. You name it, it’s your responsibility. Just plan segments of time in your schedule for paperwork.

Truthfully, setting up your own telepractice is a lot of work at the beginning. But once you get everything up and rolling, it should work fairly automatically. The best part is that you get to keep anything you bring in financially!

Work with a teletherapy company like E-Therapy

If you work with a teletherapy company, like E-Therapy, all the behind-the-scenes business details are taken care of. They will provide you with the proper paperwork and give you instructions that make it easy and quick. E-Therapy has a team in place that handles billing and insurance, so you will not have to worry about learning how to keep track of these tasks.

Our teletherapists use the eSMART platform, an all-inclusive, complete teletherapy management solution that has security and privacy components built in. You will also have access to a library of resources like tested activities for online therapy, plus diagnostics, assessments, and reporting.

Obtaining clients is easier, too. For example, E-Therapy works with public, private, virtual, and charter schools across the United States. Our account managers have hours for the states you prefer and can assign you referrals.

You get to decide when you want to work, having total control over your own schedule.

How to find the best teletherapy company

Try a simple Google search for companies that are hiring in your state or in a state that you would be willing to get licensed in. Once you find a few different teletherapy companies, see which ones fit your needs. It is important to look at things like:

hourly rates or salary

states and hours that are available

indirect vs direct time

how referrals come in

platforms used

the company culture

This will help you decide if it is the right place for you to start your journey into teletherapy. Check out E-Therapy’s Teletherapy Jobs FAQ for more info.

Take your first step to a teletherapy career with E-Therapy

https://youtu.be/zIQOU-HuLKc

E-Therapy works with hundreds of therapists and the need for more is growing. If you are interested in joining our team to provide live face-to-face online Speech-Language, Occupational, and Physical Therapy or Counseling/Social Work and Assessments/Diagnostics, then check out E-Therapy’s current Job Opportunities.

If you are not quite ready or if there are no jobs that suit you today, sign up as a therapist and we will be in touch.

Source

[mrjohntsnyder]

Telehealth Occupational Therapy - Everything You Need to Know

Chances are, you’ve heard some chatter about telehealth occupational therapy. In fact, you might even know an OT or two who has tried his or her hand at teletherapy.

But, for the most part, telehealth OT is still largely a mystery to most of us occupational therapists. There’s not too much information out there, and the little there is tends to be sorely lacking in material we can actually, well, use.

It’s a shame that most of us don’t know much about what’s involved—because telehealth is coming, whether we like it or not.

(Spoiler alert: I do!)

Telehealth occupational therapy is going to change the way we practice, and it will impact our profession in ways we have yet to imagine. And the more we know about telehealth, the better positioned we’ll be to leverage it in ways to best serve our clients and help prevent clinician burnout.

I set out to write this article so that we occupational therapy professionals would have a comprehensive resource on telehealth OT as we know it today, along with some information to help us stay up-to-date with this quickly changing landscape.

I’ll update this article regularly as the uncharted world of teletherapy begins to take form.

What is telehealth?

Telehealth refers to medical services provided over a technology platform. Pretty much any form of medical care delivered via technology vs. in-person means can be considered telehealth.

That means some of you might already be using telehealth without even knowing it.

If you use a secure texting platform to exchange messages with your patients, you’re already using telehealth.

If you deliver HEP exercises and updates to your patients, as with MedBridge Go, that’s telehealth, too.

If you review patients’ records in a shared health system portal, you’re using telehealth.

And if you securely message your patients like on WebPT's HEP platform, yep, that’s also telehealth.

Yes! Telehealth can be this simple! This is an example of secure messaging about an HEP program from WebPT's platform. 

Technically, telehealth can be broken into four categories:

Live video

Store-and-forward

Remote patient monitoring

Mobile health

Live video (also called “synchronous”) is exactly what you’d think. Store-and-forward is also called “asynchronous,” and is used to transmit imaging, as well as store and send health records. Remote patient monitoring involves electronically transferring information like blood pressure results or blood glucose levels. MedBridge Go and other forms of patient-facing HEP software are forms of mobile health.

At this point, most forms of telehealth occupational therapy will use a blend of these methods to deliver care, so it’s honestly not that important to know the four types.

Why telehealth?

Telehealth was originally devised to bring much-needed healthcare services to underserved  or rural populations, enabling patients to receive care when they might not otherwise be able to.

But even for patients who can access care, telehealth has its appeal. In today’s modern age of on-demand technomania, telehealth is wonderful option in terms of convenience and, frankly, staying on trend. If other professionals are meeting customers’ demands for on-demand care, why can’t occupational therapists?

Consider a post-CVA patient whose son would normally need to drive her to OT, but now she can ask questions and receive teletherapy in the comfort of her own home, and her son doesn’t have to miss work.

In any case, teletherapy is great for patient education, management of chronic illnesses, medication management, and more, and we occupational therapists are recognizing ways that we can provide our care remotely, as well.

Who is currently using telehealth?

Physicians: reimbursed for remote care

Physicians have been incorporating telehealth into their practice for years, as Medicare does pay for certain types of remote care. Here are some of the most popular disciplines:

Psychiatry

Dermatology

General Practice

Radiology

Mental health practitioners: addressing unmet needs

Therapists and counselors are using telemedicine to deliver care to address the overwhelming need for increased mental health delivery in the U.S.

Surveys have indicated that 43.8 million Americans have a behavioral health crisis in a single year. The scary thing is 60% of those people don’t receive treatment.

One of the reasons why telehealth is really taking off in the mental health world is that it addresses the fundamental reasons why people don’t seek treatment for mental illness: lack of access and lack of resources.

And, perhaps most importantly, telemedicine delivery is discreet and convenient. Anyone who has experienced a mental health crisis can attest to the fact that real-time, convenient treatment delivered in a private manner is priceless.

Speech-language pathologists: reaching kids in underserved areas

Preliminary research has shown that teletherapy does show promise in addressing the lack of care for children in geographically remote and underserved areas. Perhaps that is why so many teletherapy SLP providers serve a pediatric clientele.

Telehealth SLPs can remotely address articulation and phonology, expressive and receptive language, fluency, voice, and pragmatics.

Being a less hands-on discipline than OT and PT, relatively speaking, it’s no surprise that teletherapy has taken off in SLP a bit more quickly.

Physical therapists: telehealth in traditional practice

Physical therapists are just starting to use telehealth in an appreciable way.

There are several companies popping up that hire physical therapists to treat remotely. At this time, it’s pretty tough to land a full-time benefited telehealth physical therapy position, so many roles are part-time or PRN. However, many traditional brick-and-mortar PT clinics have started incorporating teletherapy into their practice.

There is also a growing movement of private, cash-based PT practitioners, many of whom are opting to use telehealth as part of a niche-based practice, if not transferring their services to exclusively telehealth in nature.

So where is OT with telehealth?

As I already mentioned, some of us use forms of telehealth already. But if you’re wondering who is working completely remotely as a telehealth occupational therapist, the answer is that more and more people are doing it every day.

One of the reasons why more occupational therapists have not gone full-throttle and dived headfirst into teletherapy is that Medicare does not currently reimburse for our use of remote medicine at this time.

Medicaid does reimburse for OT teletherapy in certain states, and third-party payers are spotty with their reimbursement. This uncertainty of payment has kept many OTs from really digging into the world of telehealth quite yet, but it’s coming. And it has already started in certain niches.

Pediatrics is leading the way

As is the case with speech-language pathology, pediatric occupational therapists make up most of the early adopters of telehealth in the OT space.

Across the board in rehab, the pediatric world has been one of the earliest to start implementing teletherapy. I was trying to determine why that is, and it may be related to the fact that children cannot drive themselves to therapy.

Pediatric teletherapists typically work with children on sensory integration, fine and gross motor skills, visual motor skills, and school-related self-care skills.

This care can be delivered via schools (the school sets up the platform and all of the therapy settings, rather than—or in addition to—using on-site therapists. Parents can also book teletherapy from their own homes. For children up to age five, early intervention teletherapy can help provide much-needed caregiver and family education, helping mitigate future academic and social risks.

Other areas where telehealth can help in occupational therapy include:

Home health (especially home modifications/aging in place)

Mental health

Outpatient neuro

Wellness and preventative care

The pros of telehealth

Improves access to those who wouldn’t otherwise get OT

Convenient

Easier on the OT’s body

Puts more emphasis on patient education and pain science

Delivers care on-demand to meet today’s consumers

The cons of telehealth

Lacking the human touch of OT

Can only treat in the state where you’re licensed (at this time). Physical therapists have the PT license compact, and maybe we will, too, someday

Patient acquisition is hard enough with traditional clinics...it's even more difficult with teletherapy

At this time, reimbursement for services is spotty, at best

But what about the rules?

Telehealth OT is a bit like the Wild West. There’s very little consistency between states in the way of laws. Some states have established laws and regulations regarding telehealth, while others haven’t even touched the subject. The AOTA has provided a chart (accessible to members only) that details information about telehealth and OT on a state-by-state basis.

Here are some other considerations to keep in mind.

Maintaining HIPAA

HIPAA applies to all medical professionals or healthcare organizations that are providing telemedicine services. According to HIPAA Journal, it’s vital to consider the channel of communication used to transmit ePHI (electronic protected health information). Here are the stipulations, and you’ll notice that they sound pretty close to what we use for non-telemedicine!

Only authorized users shall be able to access ePHI

A secure system of communication shall be used to protect the integrity of ePHI

There must be a system of monitoring communications with ePHI to prevent malicious or accidental breaches.

Maintaining standards of care

Across the board, practitioners of telemedicine are expected to adhere to standards of care that are the same—no more, no less—as what they’d provide during face-to-face visits.

Navigating reimbursement

Medicare does not currently reimburse for telehealth services, and Medicaid does reimburse on  a state-by-state basis, so you’d need to check with your individual state regarding whether you could receive reimbursement.  

Another consideration is third-party payers. Traditionally, insurance companies’ reimbursement policies change like the wind, and it’s no different with telemedicine.

The best way to find out whether an insurance company reimburses for telehealth OT is to ask them directly. Try to find a contact at each third-party payer you use, and make nice with him or her. That person will become your go-to for all things related to payments in your particular state, for your particular services provided.

What is the pay like?

The pay depends on several factors. Obviously, if you’re a private practitioner, you’ll set your own fee schedule. However, if you join an existing organization as a staff therapist, you’ll likely earn similar rates to what you’d make in a traditional brick-and-mortar clinic.

From what I can tell, ranges per hour will be anywhere from $35-45/hour, and in states with higher living expenses, the rates might be higher (how refreshing!).

One important thing to consider is that many of these roles are per diem, so you might not receive sick time, PTO, or health insurance.

What is the schedule like?

The beauty of telehealth OT is that you can set your own schedule. The other side of the coin is that you might not get all the hours you need, especially if you’re a new grad trying to pay off loans.  

It’s per diem care at its finest. But this can also be a blessing or a curse, depending on how many hours you need.

How to get into telehealth

As of today, there are three ways you can get involved with teletherapy. Here’s how to do each.

1. Start your own practice

If you start your own practice, you’ll need to understand state laws where you’re planning to treat, get licensed in the state(s) where you’re planning to treat, set up a business, attract your own patients, get liability insurance, set up a fee schedule, and all that fun stuff that goes along with owning your own clinic.

Plus, there’s the tech. You’ll need to figure out the software you’ll want to use, but most solutions make it fairly easy to hang a shingle.

Here are some of the tech solutions for OT telehealth:

BlueJay

doxy.me

eVisit

Health Recovery Solutions

Reflexion Health

VSee

2. Join an existing company

If you’re not feeling entrepreneurial, no problem! You can always find a job at an existing teletherapy company. As mentioned earlier, these companies have the same issues standard OTs do: attracting patients, and if they’re cash-based, it’s a double whammy when it comes to the challenges of marketing to patients. That said, they’re hiring and growing, so they’re clearly getting money somehow!

Here are some of the companies that provide telehealth OT services:

eLuma

Global Teletherapy

PresenceLearning - School-based

ProCare therapy

TinyEye

TalkPath Live

3. Convince your existing practice to incorporate elements of teletherapy

Telehealth can be a wonderful ancillary service, and it can also add value to a clinic’s offerings. By incorporating a telehealth wing in a clinic or facility, you will help improve patients’ access to care, and might help decrease cancellations.

This would be especially helpful in states where Medicaid is reimbursing OT treatments.

If you’re able to convince your workplace to incorporate telehealth into its practice, you’ll grow immensely in your career. Not only will you spearhead a movement to build a program in your organization (which can look great on the resume if you ever pursue non-traditional OT career paths), you can feel proud that you helped bring your workplace to the forefront of a new horizon (cue sci-fi music)!

What’s next for OT and telehealth?

Only time will tell where telehealth will take us, but we do know one thing: telemedicine is the future.

After all, Amazon’s new healthcare venture has alluded to a focus on telemedicine, wellness, and end-of-life care in a recent letter to shareholders. With Atul Gawande at the helm of this powerhouse initiative, virtual health will grow in ways we can only imagine.

So whether you enjoy hands-on care or you’re seeking a non-traditional OT role where you use your degree to its fullest, chances are, change is coming. Even if you have no intentions of landing a purely telehealth job, you’ll likely be incorporating teletherapy into your daily practice much sooner than you’d think!

What are your questions/thoughts about telehealth? Share them in the comments and I will do my best to address them in future updates to this article! 

from OT Blog - OT Potential https://ift.tt/2OMCmF3

[teachanarchy]

Editor’s note: Teaching Tolerance generally uses people-first language. The individuals interviewed for this story, however, prefer the term autistic people rather than people with autism. Out of respect for their preference, we have adjusted our usage.

School was never easy and rarely pleasant for Elly Wong. Their* smarts were not a question. They had learned to read by age 3, and grade school teachers suggested they skip a grade. But social interactions were difficult and classroom settings often battered their senses. “I’m sensitive to noise and get easily overstimulated,” Wong says. “My strongest impressions of elementary school are constant crying in response to being overwhelmed.” As the meltdowns continued into high school, a counselor recommended a psychological evaluation.

By that time, Wong had been doing independent research “through the magic of the Internet” and piecing together clues for a self-diagnosis. The psychiatrist agreed: anxiety, depression and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Wong proceeded to negotiate their own 504 plan; their parents knew little about autism and “the professionals at my school were pretty unhelpful.” The accommodations were relatively minor: Extra time on tests, use of noise-canceling headphones and subtitled videos were among them. Even so, Wong says, “I got constantly challenged over my accommodations.”

Last fall, they enrolled as a first-year student at Syracuse University in New York.

Working with and educating students like Wong who are on the autism spectrum has been the subject of much discussion and controversy in the last generation. The narrative has often been that children with these diagnoses are sources of tragedy for families and a drain on schools. Educators unfamiliar with autism and its range of expressions have often been perplexed and intimidated by students in their classrooms. Even as autism awareness has grown, many districts still lack the resources to help their teachers and schools update their practices and become more inclusive of affected students and families. Often, special education teachers must rely on their own research and resourcefulness.

In recent years, however, the neurodiversity movement, characterized by the advocacy of autistic individuals speaking for themselves, has entered the conversation. Advocates and their allies are eager to challenge pessimistic attitudes toward ASD and share insights for helping their fellow autistic people learn, cope and thrive in settings—particularly educational settings—that have often been indifferent, if not unwelcoming, to their needs.

“No one knows more about autism, about what it’s like to be autistic or what autistic people need, than autistic people ourselves,” says Julia Bascom, deputy executive director of the Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN). “We have a unique first-person perspective, and that perspective absolutely has to be centered in any sort of advocacy work focused on our community.”

Old-School Autism Education Though our understanding has grown significantly in recent years, the first diagnosis of autism as a distinct neurological disorder only occurred in the 1940s. Decades later, British psychiatrist Lorna Wing successfully made the case that autistic behaviors take different forms in different people, from nonspeaking individuals capable of little social engagement to those adept at navigating—or excelling—in society. Building on 1930s research by Austrian Hans Asperger, Wing described an “autism spectrum” and championed its 1980 inclusion in the bible of psychiatry, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or DSM.

Today, ASD is viewed as a neurological disorder in a person’s ability to  send social cues or process incoming ones. “By definition, autistic people have a language impairment,” says Sharon Rosenbloom, a speech pathologist, founder of Turning Pointe Autism Foundation and mother of Joey, an adult autistic son. “They’re neurologically disorganized.” Along with those issues, many autistics deal with high levels of anxiety and hypersensitivity to sensory stimulation.

Traditional autism therapy has emphasized teaching autistic kids to act as “normal” as possible. “We often see schools focusing on social skills training and behavior modification to make children appear less visibly autistic,” says ASAN’s Bascom. Unfortunately, these therapies have frequently come at the expense of engagement and learning.

Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA therapy) has been the cornerstone of traditional therapy. ABA therapy recommends 40 hours a week of repetitive drills and positive-reinforcement techniques to attempt to replace unwanted behaviors with more socially acceptable ones. For example, the teacher or therapist may work with an autistic child one-on-one to gradually build up his or her ability to maintain eye contact, perhaps rewarded with something like a sip of juice. Reducing self-stimulation—the flapping of hands, rhythmic rocking, fidgeting with a favorite object or other repetitive motions associated with autism—is also stressed. ABA works on verbal skills as well, promoting speech fluency in speaking students and having nonspeaking students pick out flash cards to develop the association between words and objects.

Critics of ABA therapies express frustration with their concentration on students’ deficits at the expense of celebrating their interests or strengths. Ido Kedar, a nonspeaking autistic teen, expresses his contempt for ABA in his book, Ido in Autismland. His deficits are not cognitive, but a self-described neurological disconnect between mind and body. “In school I sat through ABC tapes over and over and added 1 + 2 = 3 over and over,” he recalls. “I was bored out of my wits. It made me die inside. I was like a zombie inside because I had no hope.”

“Too often we teach autistic students using a deficit model—spending our time trying to fix what they can’t do instead of building out from what they can,” says Leah Kelley, a veteran special education teacher near Vancouver, British Columbia, and mother of an autistic son. “It’s a pathologized and medicalized model.”

It is past time to update and upgrade those models, says Kelley and other autism advocates and allies. More and more, the theories of medical experts and proponents of “cope till you cure” are being overwritten by the lived experiences of autistic kids and adults themselves. They want to share their narratives, and—thanks to new thinking in communication therapies as well as new assistive technologies—more are having the chance to tell them. An emerging theme? Autistics want help but are wary of people trying to “fix” them.

Multiple Methods In his book, Kedar describes his early life as feeling trapped in an insubordinate body; not even those closest to him knew how to reach him. As a nonspeaking autistic, he had no words to call for help, and dyspraxia blocked him from being able to accurately signal his needs. His movements and actions often appeared impulsive and chaotic. Kedar indicates the big breakthrough in his ability to express himself came at age 7. While trapped with his own thoughts, he had been learning to read. Now he also began to write, forming words with a letter board and—eventually—by typing. The process was painstaking, but it soon became clear that he was an aware and articulate kid with a strong desire to express himself. With the means to communicate, Ido progressed rapidly, and within two years was being mainstreamed in several of his middle school classes. Now in high school, he is reported to be on a college-bound track.

For many advocates and allies, matching autistic students with the means to communicate to the best of their ability is priority number one. But there is no one-size-fits-most fix, says Rosenbloom. She likens the process to being fitted for eyeglasses. “When I get the right prescription, I can see well,” she says. In the same way, any prescription to aid communication for those on the autism spectrum requires customization.

“Some of us will be able to speak fluently, but our speech may not match what we want to say, while others might not be able to use oral speech as well,” explains Bascom. “Autistic students should have multiple methods of communication made available to use, whether that looks like a dedicated speech-generating device, a text-to-speech app on an iPad, sign language, or a pencil and paper. But it’s not enough to just give someone access to an alternative; autistic students with communication impairments need qualified staff working with us who can systematically teach the hows and whys of communication as well.”

Presume Intellect Bascom and Rosenbloom agree on another point when it comes to working with autistic students: Presume intellect. That means not talking about autistic students in the third person when they are present. That means speaking to them in tones and complete sentences appropriate for their age, not baby talk. Rosenbloom says she has witnessed autistic kids respond to a new teacher speaking to them normally with a look that says, “Whoa!”

“I have a mantra: Develop a relationship,” she says. “Presume there’s a mind in there, ready to teach you something you don’t know.”

Relating and communicating are practices that too often have been absent from autism education. Many autistic people are very aware when non-autistic educators are underestimating or patronizing them. Rosenbloom contends that respectful and meaningful interaction has the potential to reduce aggressive and self-injurious behaviors as autistic students learn to trust they can get their needs met without melting down.

Honoring that trust is another part of helping autistic individuals connect with the world. After years of acquiescing to the wills of others, many have developed understandable stores of resentment toward ableist attitudes. They need to be able to say "no" to what is being asked and trust it will be respected, says Kelley, who argues that better treatment for autistic people is a matter of social justice. “We dehumanize people when we don’t let them say 'no.' So much of their therapy has been compliance based, which is a real denial of dissent. Unless you allow dissent, whatever 'yes' you get is absolutely meaningless.”

This position echoes the motto of ASAN: “Nothing About Us Without Us.” More and more autistic young people and adults—like Elly Wong, Julie Bascom and Ido Kedar—are ready and determined to inform improvements in educational policies and practices that affect them and other neurodiverse students. Their contributions to more inclusive schools can only benefit us all, wherever we live on the neurodiversity spectrum.

*Wong’s preferred pronoun is they.

Two recent books, NeuroTribes by Steve Silberman and In a Different Key by John Donvan and Caren Zucker, offer compelling narrative histories of the scientific and social explorations of autism’s complexities and perplexities.

Glossary of Autism-related Terms Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA) Therapies targeted to increase or decrease specific behaviors Asperger syndrome A disorder on the autism spectrum, distinguished by relatively intact language and cognitive skills; as of 2013, Asperger syndrome was eliminated as a distinct diagnosis and folded into the autism spectrum Assistive and adaptive technology Devices or equipment used to facilitate functional capabilities of people with disabilities; for autistics, these may include computer tablets and software to aid communication Dyspraxia Difficulty with coordination and motor planning High-functioning/low-functioning autism Terms traditionally used to describe the severity of autism in individuals; autism advocates now reject this usage Neurodiversity The concept that neurological differences in people represent normal, natural variations; many autism advocates embrace this term as a way to challenge pathologized models of autism Prompt A cue or hint to assist communication or behavior by autistic students “Stimming” Self-stimulating behavior; repetitive movements or vocalizations common in autistic individuals as a means for calming or entertaining themselves Tactile defensiveness Extreme sensitivity to specific textural stimuli