This text-based course is a transcript of the webinar, What Does Speech-Language Pathology Have to do with Mental Health? Considerations for SLPs Working with Children and Adolescents with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders, presented by Sarah Aielli, MS, CCC-SLP and Mallory Wallace, MS, CCC-SLP. This course is presented in partnership with Cincinnati Children's Hospital.
Learning Objectives
- After this course, participants will be able to describe the relationship between language and social communication disorders and emotional-behavioral disorders.
- After this course, participants will be able to verbalize helpful strategies and considerations for initiating services with a child with a mental health diagnosis.
- After this course, participants will be able to recognize warning signs of mental illness and access basic resources on mental health.
Introduction and Overview
We divided this course into three main sections. Our first section deals with the background on speech-language pathology and mental health. The second portion will outline what to do if you are assigned a child with an emotional behavioral disorder: what you need to know and where to begin. Thirdly, we’ll touch on what to do if you suspect that one of your current clients has an undiagnosed or untreated emotional behavioral disorder.
Just a few notes on terminology before we begin. Terminology varies a lot by discipline and institution. We will use the following terminology interchangeably throughout the presentation: mental health disorders and diagnoses, psychiatric disorders and diagnoses, emotional-behavioral disorders (EBD) and emotional disturbance (ED). You might also hear us refer to NAMI, which is the National Alliance on Mental Health, and is a private organization. We also often refer to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, or SAMHSA, which is a government organization.
Speech-Language Pathology and Mental Health
To begin, I want to talk about our background and our perspective. We work at CCHMC, in the Division of Psychiatry. We work with children ranging in age from 2 to 18 years old. Our setting includes inpatient units. These are more short-term hospitalizations where children stay on average for about one week. The team works on stabilizing them, evaluating them, and getting services in place for discharge. We also work in the context of residential units or residential programs. These are longer term programs where children maybe have multiple failed inpatient hospitalizations and aren’t doing well in the short term treatment programs, so they recommend a longer term treatment for them (three months to one year).
Our partial hospitalization program is more of a day treatment program, where children come during the day, and then go home in the evening. They receive school, mental health therapies and other therapies through the program. We also work in a preschool program for preschool-aged children with mental health needs. These children often have open cases with child services. Then, finally, our setting includes an inpatient/outpatient therapy program. This is for children who need additional support or services before entering a general outpatient program. These are children that we would refer from our other programs.
The children we work with are admitted to the hospital for a variety of reasons. Most of them are admitted for some type of aggression. This can be verbal aggression. This includes physical aggression to self, others, or property. They’re referred for out-of-control behavior, suicidal ideation, gestures, or attempts, and also for homicidal ideation, gestures, or attempts.
