Audiology and speech pathology appointments

Earlier this year we had a 2 appointment day at the Child Development Centre.

Audiologist This was a follow up from the appointment last June, to be sure that the “sluggishness” in her ears at that time was only due to a cold and nothing worse.  (She’d been referred for the first appointment because at 4 months corrected she wasn’t making any consonant sounds.)

Talia was upset to return to the clinic but calmed down and turned to hear all the sounds played, which was a relief.  They asked if I wanted them to do a physical examination of her ears but knowing how much she hates anyone touching her ears (major screaming session), I decided not to worry about it. No need to see them again, hooray!

Speech pathologist This was a first appointment after a referral made in (drumroll) May 2008! Can you tell they don’t have enough SPs in the public system here? I would have gone private if I was really worried, but figured Talia would catch up in her own time.

I had a lovely surprise before we went. They had sent a form asking how many words she said spontaneously (ie not just copying you) and I had filled it out in December but now went over it again in mid January and was able to circle a heap more words. I thought it was going to be about 60 words, but including animal noises, names of characters etc, it was more like 90. In perspective: 15 months - no clear words. 18 months - less than 10 words. 21 months - 90 words. So proud of my little cherub.

At the appointment Talia was brilliant, played with all the toys, even came out with a new word while we were there. The SP said she was well on the way to the 2 year average which is basically (a) 50 words and (b) two word sentences. We didn’t have 2 word sentences at that stage, but apparently they usually consist of object + describing word or doing word, and Talia knew lots of objects but said very few describing/doing words. So that’s what I have been trying to concentrate on while I’m playing with her . The SP also said Talia was great at commenting and understands what’s being said, but wasn’t so good at using language for “social purposes” - for example she didn’t call for attention or make requests much using words. So that’s something else I said I would be trying to work on.

We agreed to have a follow up appoinment in 3-4 months time, and that is now scheduled for 14 April - next week.  Since the January appointment Talia has more than doubled her vocabulary.  In fact I’ve stopped trying to keep a record because she is learning words faster than I’m remembering to write them down.  She knows a lot more verbs and adjectives, and uses words to make requests.  (So much nicer than saying “eeeeuurghh” when she wants something!)  She can make sentences of up to 4 words and constantly amazes me with what comes out of her mouth (in the vocab department!)  It’s a great joy to me to see her improve so rapidly after a slow start, especially as it was the area of development where she was most delayed at her 12 month corrected assessment.

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This is the main part of the report we received after our January appointment.

Your child has strengths in:

• pretend play - imitating
• comprehension - following instructions, understanding questions and concepts

We found your child needs help with:

• Developing language for social purposes eg calling, requesting
• Increasing action and describing words

All (almost) clear

Talia finally had a hearing check at the audiologists today, following on from the one where she was too clogged up with a cold to be able to test properly.  It showed that although her eustachian tubes are “sluggish”, her hearing is within normal ranges.  They’ve recommended we go back in summer to confirm that the sluggish tubes are not a permanent problem.

Hoorah, one less thing on the list of potential problems! Although I’m sure selective deafness is only a matter of time…

A word in your ear…

At her 8 month (corrected) paediatrician appointment Talia was making very few consonant sounds, so we were told she would be given another hearing test.  Three months later we still hadn’t received our appointment, so I phoned the hospital to ask what was happening.  Less than 2 days later the audiology people were hastily offering us an appointment for early the following week (today).  Ho hum.

Unfortunately Talia currently has a cold, and the audiologist decided that this was likely to be blocking her ears at the moment.  She was able to determine that Talia hears loud noises (we knew this) but could not get down to the 20 decibel level they would be happy with.  We will need to return for a second appointment in a month’s time, a week before her 12 month (corrected) paediatrician appointment.

At the moment she does babble, and uses da, dee, ya, wa, ba and sometimes na, ma, ga.  Not to mention lots of “oooh!” which is very cute.  The only word in her vocabulary that I am certain of is “cat” but she does struggle to say it.  The audiologist said that, given her other delays, it’s likely that speech will also be delayed (so no surprises there!)  As long as she has no physical impediment (like a glue ear) to hearing then I’m really not too fussed.