TeleIntervention: Improving Service Delivery to Young Children With Hearing Loss and Their Families Through Telepractice
As telecommunication technology continues to evolve, opportunities are emerging for telepractice to meet the communication needs of children with hearing loss. As well, documented shortages of well-trained speech-language pathologists and pediatric audiologists are leading some centers to augment their service delivery through telepractice as a means to meet a need for qualified providers. For families of young children with hearing loss, obtaining services that support auditory learning and spoken language can be a challenge in some communities. One form of telepractice, teleintervention, provides early intervention services to families of children with hearing loss using internet-based videoconferencing to model and coach parents in language facilitation techniques. Though it is a relatively new service delivery model, preliminary results are promising.