Speech therapy campaign at HEAL Africa: about fifty patients cared for
For a week, about fifty patients were received at HEAL Africa Hospital, Goma, during a speech therapy campaign that provided an assessment of children with cleft palate and their initiation to language. The campaign was motivated by the idea to enlighten patients regarding their diagnosis and to inform parents of the behavior to adopt in order to help their children who have pronunciation problems.
It was also a question of introducing the nursing staff involved in the care of children at HEAL Africa Hospital to the diagnosis of the most recurrent pathologies affecting speech. The sessions resulted in the installation of a pediatric neurology department at HEAL Africa Hospital, operational from Monday 30/01/2023.
Speech therapist working for Smile Train, an organization which supports HEAL Africa in the repair of cleft lip and / or palate in DRC, Mrs. Jessica IKETE found in her visit to Goma an opportunity to initiate care providers into the basics of speech therapy. “This will help as many people as possible to understand their speaking disorders, and to regain their ability to articulated language,” she said.
A specialty at the crossroads of several fields
Speech therapy has not yet been fully integrated into the daily lives of people in the Democratic Republic of Congo. From language delay to articulatory disorders, dyslexia (mental disorder with repercussions on speech and learning to read and write) or attention disorders, speech therapy brings considerable advantages especially for children.
Depending on the various functional or cognitive disorders, speech therapy can be used to improve children’s relationship with language. This paramedical profession aims to prevent, evaluate and treat all disorders of human communication, oral or written, as well as disorders of psychological or physiological origin associated with them. “From young children to the elderly, situations requiring speech therapy are very numerous and concern all audiences,” added Ms. Jessica as she was ending the campaign at HEAL Africa Hospital.
The scope of speech therapy extends to several disciplines. This specialty applies to medicine, pedagogy, pediatric neurology, and everything related to articulation problems in certain cases of disease such as stroke, cerebral palsy (BMI), hearing-impaired children (usually characterized by difficulty focusing at school).
A complement in the care of children with cleft lip and palate
Speech therapy is one of the final steps in the management of cleft lip and palate. This care meets a need that is both aesthetic and functional, as it is about the arrangement of the alignment of the lips, the symmetry of the lips, nostrils, teeth, etc.). The need is functional in the sense that we have to make sure there is an improvement in language in the patient, that he articulates both nasal and oral sounds, etc.
This comprehensive management of the cleft lip and/or palate already begins in the prenatal period by the psychological preparation of parents and the whole family to welcome a child with cleft (malformation likely to be detected on ultrasound from the thirteenth week of pregnancy). At the birth of the child with a cleft begins his nutritional management, in order to prepare his body for surgery. This is the second stage of the deformity management, which will be followed by surgery at 3 months for a cleft lip and at 9 months in the case of a cleft palate.
The fourth stage consists of post-operative follow-up. It is after that the speech therapy intervenes, and then orthodontics comes to close the process by a rearrangement of the patient’s teeth as well as bone grafts at the velar level.