Quick SALT rant

[Flamesparrow]

Since DD started preschool I have been asking about her speech not being quite right. They told me she would catch up.

She started in Reception this September, and our first parent's evening - November - they asked us if we wanted her referred for Speech Therapy (without me mentioning it).

In April she failed her hearing test (the 5yr school starting check thing) and was referred to an audiologist as it was severe enough rather than just a nurse retest.

We are waiting to hear from that, last I heard, there was no clinic in June so it will be at least July or August.

Today we got a letter saying she has been referred for Speech Therapy - Hurrah I thought... then I read "The appropriate therapist will contact you in the next 13 weeks"

13 WEEKS???

STILL???

She will have gone through a whole year of school without the help

I am angry with myself more than anything for not pushing when I was first concerned, but I thought I was being pfb about it. I am angry with myself for believing the hv last summer when I asked about her hearing and rattling something behind her head meant she was fine .

I want the hearing test now. I want to know if there is a big problem, a medium problem or if she couldn't be arsed to do the test properly (the latter is possible, but the first two explain her speech).

ARGH!

Would I be better off to go private?? How much would it cost me???

oh dear how very very annoying. It is worthwhile just having a one off appointment - as well as assessing they can provide a scheme of work for both you and school to help DD with. DS's initial report and work plan cost £150 - but that included 2 SALT home visits and a nursery visit so very reasonable value.

Have a look for Davros's thread on cerebra funding, your DD may be entitled to apply for £500 per year funding for private SALT.

Priavte speech theraphy is expensive !

I paid for a private hearing test in Surrey for my DS and paid £25 , straight away it indicated glue ear, we paid privately then to see an ENT consultant and then saw him on NHS.

whereabouts are you in the country - could give you the link to the company that did hearing test .

I think the first thing you need to do is get the hearing test done before you go down the route of SALT.

can I just piggyback a rant. DS first went on SALT waiting list in March, has had 4 assessment appointments, but no actual therapy other than being given some v. dull exercises to do. NB I do realise that even having 4 appointments is more than some parents on here get for their kids btw! In November we were put on waiting list for Hanen course, to be told last week, at 6 p.m. before the home visit before the course that DS had improved too much to do the course . (he is still 12 months behind for both expressive and receptive language with some social communication difficulties so not age appropriate by any means). DS nearly got kicked off the summer speech group too for being too "improved"

ooh thank you for the links.

I agree that the hearing is the most important thing atm. I'm in Bournemouth. I would be happier to wait for the speech therapy if I knew it was likely more a fixable hearing based problem.

Her speech has always been much more of a concern in its clarity rather than the delay (although there is some delay when I hear the difference with her speaking to her friends), which is making me more sure that her hearing is an issue. She is very Loud too - but it may be wishful thinking that that isn't just her natural state

Is there a private hospital near you ? If so contact them and see how much they charge for a hearing test.

My DS initally had SALT aas like you it was his clarity and diffciulty in pronucing some sounds - 'S' & 'F'.

No improvement was being made with SALT so I pushed for hearing test - the wait neing some 3 to 6 months , got one done privately - indicated glue ear. Following week went to GP got a refferal to private ENT consultant which we paid for and he had a grommet op a few months later on NHS.

Basically by paying privately for hearing test and inital ENT consultation we bypassed a queue of 12 months .

yup, def want both.

i am so angry with myself for just believing that she would catch up, but where I had no other experience and I was already worrying about AS issues, I just took the route of believing them

I am going to investigate hearing tests

I'm an slt, or perhaps I should say 'was' as I don't work anymore.

It's very frustrating hearing tales like yours. I can understand why you are annoyed. If you know anyone else in your situation, please tell them that they can refer their own children, they do not need to wait until the school or gp does it. If you have only just reeceived your letter from the slt dept it sounds as though the school have only just sent the referral.

what sort of difficulty is your daughter experiencing? Is it with the sounds she is using (speech) or the sentences she is putting together(language), or both? Do you notice a problem with her hearing, apart from the loud voice?

dhw - not all areas allow self-referral unfortunately. Liverpool doesn't

Hiya

It is clarity more than language - she knows the words, but they don't come out right iyswim. Like her beds - she doesn't say bunk bed, she says bunch bed. Forgot was always Bogot until a couple of weeks ago.

Her hearing - we constantly have to repeat things, we used to think it was just a habit she had gotten into but since the hearing test I am being more tolerant. It could still be that her hearing is fine, but it seems unlikely.

It's good that it sounds as though your dd's speech sounds are improving if she is now saying 'forgot' more accurately. Does she use the 'f' sound in other words too? Is it generally easy for people who don't know her to understand what she says?

My ds (6yrs) has glue ear and I'm always having to repeat myself. Of course, he is a typical boy and half the time it is because he is not listening. Don't know why he doesn't want to listen to me all the time!

Things that I tell him to remember, particularly at school, are to look at the person who is talking to him, sit at the front of the class near the teacher and that it is ok to ask if you have not heard what the teacher said. The teacher should make sure that your dd is looking at her before telling her something.

When you do get your slt appt, if they feel she requires therapy sessions and there is a waiting list for that, I would ask if you can be given a programme of activities to do at home in the meantime.

TC- that is a shame that parents cannot refer direct in liverpool. When I was working there was a move to make srvices more accesible to parents and only require a medical referral for a specialist assessment like feeding. Perhaps it is a way of cutting down 'inappropriate referrals'!

Yup, she uses it fine in other words. It seems to be when she hasn't heard the word clearly, she says what she thinks is right. Where we thought it was normal, we didn't really encourage her saying it right, and now it has been so long that she gets upset ("After" is another one - she always says "Lafter").

People tend to understand 90% of what she says - it is better if she speaks slowly. She does have to repeat herself though to make herself understood and I remember how frustrating that was (very quietly spoken so always repeating myself as a child). her friends try to correct her too - to start with she said they were helping her, but now she seems to think they are poking fun (They aren't).

I don't think we can direct refer here either (my mum was chatting to the therapist when she was last in school and she would have mentioned it surely?).

Plus side - we are on a course which is designed to help those with SEN get more self confidence etc

Flame- what age did this mis-pronouncing start?
DD has many words which have their own 'dd' version....
When do I need to worry?

I'd say that you have done the right thing in not correcting her. It must be very annoying having your friends correct you.

If she can be understood mostly that is good. Some of her sound substitutions sound unusual (doesn't mean it more serious though, so don't panic!) which can make it more difficult to understand. If you think about it, lots of children use 't' instaed of 'k' e.g. tup for cup. so it is quite easy to understand and often we don't even notice as we hear it so often.

EPPP- depends on lots of different things. Developing an adult speech pattern is a bit like learning the piano. i.e. you would make mistakes and play some wrong notes before you managed to play a piece accurately. With speech it is normal for children to get sounds wrong for quite a long time before they ger it right. (My 3 1/4 yr dd started speaking at 10mths but still has some speech sound immaturities. I'm not concerned)

Sorry, a bit garbled. I have said dd playing music on her saucepan lids and 'singing' at the top of her voice in the background. Very off-putting.

I worry, because some of her substitutions are the same ones my db made- and he DID have hearing issues
One of the things she does though (which he didn't) is to pronounce everything ending in 'o' as 'oo' eg Hippoo, Peepoo, Helloo- is this odd?

EPPP: Difficlut to say in the absence of more info e.g.How old is she and how many words is she tendig to put together in a sentence?

She is 2.4, she uses full sentences, eg 'Don't want to have milk upstairs, want to have it downstairs with my breakfast please'
She has an excellent vocabulary, but says brownd, swand, wardrome, and the 'oo' words. I only really noticed last night, but she has a very strong 'lisp' with 's's too- ie cant pronounce s at all.
DH and I often mention her funny little accent- she really doesn't sound like either of us, nor like any of her (brummie) nursery carers, but I don't tend to correct her, as she is so young, just model good clear speech for her.

Sorry Flame, didn't mean to hijack your thread, and I realise you have valid concerns with your dd.

www.speech-language-therapy.com/acquisition.html

lots of useful (if technical) info about what speech sounds are to be expected at what age.

Yes, sorry flame!
EPPP: sounds like your dd has excellent language development. At 2 1/2 I wouldn't worry too much. Maybe a hearing test if she has not had one and you think she may not be hearing well.

Thats really interesting Total Chaos- thank you.

I'm not worried about her language- just her speech if that makes sense- thanks for your help dhwt!