-: Megan Murray,
and I am a medical speech language pathologist.
So I currently work in the skilled nursing facility
and outpatient settings, and I work with the adult
and geriatric population to help treat, well,
evaluate, treat people with swallowing disorders,
speech and language disorders,
cognitive disorders, and voice disorders.
So we work a lot with stroke patients.
A lot of times when people have strokes,
at least one side of their body is very weak as a result.
So they have a lot of deficits especially with swallowing.
So, like a physical therapist would,
I would help them regain their strength,
but, to this section of the body.
A lot of times people will have things go down
the wrong pipe, because again,
their muscles are very weak from the stroke.
So what I would do is I would evaluate them,
see what diet and liquids would be safe for them
to eat or swallow.
And I would also give them
exercises to do to help regain that function again.
A lot of times when we evaluate them,
they might not be ready for the regular water
that we might be drinking,
we might have to thicken their water a little bit,
or their juices, what have you, and we might have to
put them on a puree diet like applesauce, that consistency.
So my job would be to get them back to their prior level
of function, which would be,
eating a pizza again, and drinking soda again.
That's just one of the examples
of something that I would do.
Some patients aren't aware of their deficit,
so I might probe a little bit more;
Oh can you tell me what day it is, the year?
Why are you here?
Any coughing or choking when you eat or drink?
And all the while I'm assessing their voice to see
is there any abnormality there.
They may have been in the hospital
and have had been intubated,
so that'll leave their voice a little breathy or hoarse.
So that's all things that I'm kind of assessing,
while they're giving me this feedback
about how they're doing.
Same with their speech and their language skills.
I can tell pretty instantly how their speech
and their language are doing when I'm going in
and having this dialogue with them.