Epidemiology of communication disorders in childhood phoniatric clinical practice

• Autor(a) principal: Baptista,Marta Gonçalves Gimenez
• Data de Publicação: 2015
• Outros Autores: Novaes,Beatriz Cavalcanti Albuquerque Caiuby, Favero,Mariana Lopes
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Brazilian Journal of Otorhinolaryngology
• Texto Completo: http://old.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1808-86942015000400368
• topic: Child language; Language development; Speech disorders; Epidemiology

INTRODUCTION: Language acquisition and development require an understanding of physical and psychosocial aspects during diagnosis and treatment. At this point, a partnership between phoniatric physicians and other health professionals is often a determinant for favorable prognosis.OBJECTIVE: To identify the clinical and epidemiological characteristics of a pediatric population attending a phoniatric clinical practice.METHODS: Study design: Cross-sectional cohort. Retrospective, epidemiological study of 297 children, seen in phoniatric appointments between 1976 and 2005. Outcome variables were referral origin, gender, age, mean age, diagnosis, and treatment approach.RESULTS: 66% were male and 34% were female, with a mean age of 6.4 years. The largest number of referrals for phoniatric treatments came from speech therapists (38%). The predominant complaint was alteration in speech (35%); the diagnostics in speech, language, and fluency (49.5%) are noteworthy. Considering the total of the patients analyzed, 28.2% were referred for speech therapy and 11.8% for psychotherapy.CONCLUSION: The studied population is predominantly male, the diagnosis points to a higher incidence in cases of impairment in speech, language, and fluency; the most common treatment was speech therapy.