Today we are excited to have a guest blogger Dr. Hope Reed! She
is one of my former graduate professors, so I can personally attest to the fact
that she is not only a great SLP, but also a professional who really knows her
subject matter! We have asked her to share about her book The Source for Counseling
for SLPs. Counseling is a subject that can be easily overlooked yet it is
crucial to our profession. How have you incorporated counseling into your practice?
I have been asked to participate in this blog and share my
knowledge regarding the evidence-based topic of counseling patients/students
and their caregivers. I am passionate about counseling! I believe that if we
take care of caregivers (i.e., parents, spouses, and so forth) that we better
care for our patients/students, too. Neidecker and Blosser (1993, p. 247)
stated it best, in my opinion: “Without counseling, therapy alone would be ineffective.”
Speech-language pathology is a science, or WHAT
we do. However, great clinicians have also figured out something else…that
there is also an art to what we do, or HOW
we do it, and that is counseling.
 |
| Picture from www.linguisystems.com |
My experiences with counseling began when I was an undergraduate
student at Alabama A & M University, as I was required (and gladly so) to
take a course entitled Counseling Parents of Exceptional Children during my
senior year. I went on to work in the public schools and home health care and found
those to be “rich” territories for counseling. A requirement at the end of my
doctoral program at Nova Southeastern University was to complete a counseling
course, as well with the late Dr. Larry Bloom. My happiest moments and greatest
successes, professionally, are direct results of my knowledge and grasp of the
importance of counseling, meaning that I not only must attend to my patients’
communicative, cognitive, and swallowing needs, but I should and must also
address their emotional needs and those of their caregivers. I must balance
doing so without sacrificing my own mental health and happiness in the process
(i.e., suffering from burn-out, assuming/taking on the problems of others as my
own, and learning that what I do for a profession is NOT who I am as a person).
There is a great demand for more information about counseling in our
field, and LinguiSystems (LS) recognized this fact several years ago. I have
published an ASHA-approved online continuing education course as well as a
guide about counseling (both are free, available from the LS Website in their
FREE for YOU section). These items became so popular that LS then asked me to
write a full book (also available on CD), published in fall, 2011: The SOURCE for Counseling for SLPs. The
link to this product is provided below, and there, you will find a product demo and other information. http://www.linguisystems.com/products/product/display?itemid=10690
I invite you to learn more about counseling, knowledge that will help
you to be a better clinician, no matter your work setting or patient/student
population!
 |
| Picture and biography from www.aamu.edu |
Dr. Hope Reed earned
her doctorate in speech-language pathology from Nova Southeastern University
and her masters in speech-language pathology and bachelors in special
education/speech-language pathology from Alabama A&M University. Dr. Reed
is an Associate Professor and has served the program since 2002. She teaches
child language, counseling, and methods/materials coursework. Dr. Reed is the
only Certified Orofacial Myologist in Alabama and operates the world’s first
university-based clinic for children and adults with orofacial myofunctional
disorders. Her research encompassing counseling patients with communication and
swallowing disorders and their caregivers, health literacy, and minority
success in higher education has culminated in the publication of numerous books
and articles. Dr. Reed is frequently invited to present at state speech and
hearing conventions on the topics of counseling and PRAXIS passage.
No comments:
Post a Comment