Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Aug 31;69(2):e1-e12.
doi: 10.4102/sajcd.v69i2.917.

The experiences of speech-language therapists providing telerehabilitation services to children with autism spectrum disorder

Saira B Karrim  1 , Penelope S Flack, Urisha Naidoo, Stephanie Beagle, Abigail Pontin
Affiliations

The experiences of speech-language therapists providing telerehabilitation services to children with autism spectrum disorder

Saira B Karrim et al. S Afr J Commun Disord. .

Abstract

Background: There has been an increased emergence of the use of telerehabilitation by speech-language therapists (SLTs) in South Africa since the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

Objectives: To explore the criteria that SLTs use when recommending telerehabilitation for children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), the technical skills required, strategies used by SLTs, the restrictions encountered when conducting telerehabilitation and the views of SLTs on telerehabilitation in comparison to face-to-face therapy for children with ASD.

Method: A descriptive, phenomenological, qualitative study design was utilised. Purposive and snowball sampling techniques were employed. Six SLTs from the private sector, who had experience providing telerehabilitation to children with ASD, were recruited from three provinces in South Africa. Data were gathered via semistructured online interviews and analysed using thematic analysis.

Results: Two out of five themes that emerged from this study are presented in this paper, i.e. approaches to telerehabilitation and the benefits of telerehabilitation. Results revealed that telerehabilitation was used to provide assessment and therapy during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns as an alternative method of service delivery. Assessment and treatment strategies included synchronous and asynchronous methods, family collaboration, social stories, frequent breaks and interactive sessions. Telerehabilitation reduced the client's and SLT's travel costs and increased caregiver and clinician satisfaction. Client progress and increased awareness of SLT were viewed as further benefits.

Conclusion: Telerehabilitation was found to be beneficial to most children with ASD, and in most cases, the benefits far outweighed the challenges encountered. Clinical implications included the need for caregiver support in facilitating effective carryover, an increase in SLTs' knowledge and the opportunity to provide services to a broader geographical range. Limitations of the study are included.

Keywords: South Africa; autism spectrum disorder; experiences; speech language therapist; telerehabilitation.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no financial or personal relationships that may have inappropriately influenced them in writing this article.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Overview of themes and subthemes that constitute the results of the study.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Aggarwal, K., Patel, R., & Ravi, R. (2021). Uptake of telepractice among speech-language therapists following COVID-19 pandemic in India. Speech, Language and Hearing, 24(4), 228–234.
    1. Alkhalifah, S., & Aldhalaan, H. (2018). Telehealth services for children with autism spectrum disorders in rural areas of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: Overview and recommendations. JMIR Pediatrics and Parenting, 1(2), e11402. - PMC - PubMed
    1. American Speech and Hearing Association . (2019). Telepractice. Retrieved from http://www.asha.org/Practice-Portal/Professional-Issues/Telepractice/
    1. Bateman, C. (2013). Autism-mitigating a global epidemic. SAMJ: South African Medical Journal, 103(5), 276–278. - PubMed
    1. Beiting, M., & Nicolet, G. (2020). Screenless teletherapy and silent telesupervision: Leveraging technology for innovative service delivery and clinician training in speech-language pathology during the COVID-19 Era. CommonHealth, 1(3), 106–120.