Survey concerning adults receiving speech therapyat community-based health-care and social-welfare facilities

Abstract

    A survey was conducted to study the situation of adults who are in speech therapy at community-based health-care and social-welfare facilities, in order to explore future directions of community-based speech therapy. A total of 364 subjects with cerebral vascular injury receiving community-based speech therapy in Tokyo participated in the survey. The following observations were made based on the results. (1) 98 percent of the subjects were covered by long-term nursing-care insurance and approximately 70 percent were aphasic. (2) The median post-onset time when they first received community-based speech therapy was 13.2 months, and of the 47 percent who started receiving community-based speech therapy within one year post-onset, more than 30 percent had never had speech therapy before. (3) Most subjects started speech therapy at hospitals and subsequently were referred to community-based services.
    Problems associated with community-based speech therapy covered under long-term nursing-care insurance were discussed based on the results.