In a perfect world, children are born with no problems, and every child passes each developmental goal with flying colors. In that imaginary world, every young child is beginning to put words together, mimicking sounds and developing the early stages of language. When reality intervenes and your child’s speech and language development falls short of these perfect expectations, Coshocton Hospital Speech and Language Pathologist Jackie Mullet, MA, CCC-SLP, is here to help.
Jackie is trained to identify language disorders in infants, including problems such as:
- Expressive language disorder: The child has difficulty sharing thoughts, ideas and feelings
- Articulation disorder: Has difficulty with sounds and often uses one sound for another (“f” sound for “s”)
- Receptive disorder: The ability to understand language
When a problem is suspected by the pediatrician or family medicine physician, the child is referred to Jackie for evaluation and diagnosis of the language problem. Some functional disorders can be corrected with the speech therapist’s intervention, but other problems may be a part of a more complex medical problem such aphasia, autism, hearing impairment or learning disabilities. In these cases, Jackie works with her patients to develop the skills needed to reach whatever level of communication is possible.
Speech Problems Aren’t Unique to Kids
While many speech and language disorders surface in childhood, there are a host of other issues that can also be encountered at any time of life. Jackie is trained to assist with a range of communication disorders resulting from voice disorders, traumatic brain injuries, stroke or other health issues.
Jackie works to address a variety of speech and language problems in adults including:
- Swallowing dysphagia – Difficulty swallowing as a result of a stroke, brain injury, weakness of function, disease or breakdown of head or neck structures.
- Aphasia – An acquired communication disorder that impairs a person’s ability to express him- or herself in written and/or verbal form, but does not affect the person’s intelligence. Aphasia is often the result of a stroke or brain injury.
- Dysarthria – A motor speech disorder that affects the production of speech, often associated with the incoordination of speech musculature. This is a condition that can affect both children and adults.
- Hearing impairment – Therapy to improve speech affected by hearing loss
Jackie earned her Bachelor of Arts in Speech and Language Pathology and Audiology and her Masters in Speech and Language Pathology from The University of Akron. Her office is located on the lower level of the Coshocton Hospital 311 Building at 311 S. 15th St. If you or a loved one of any age from infant through maturity may benefit from speech and language therapy, please contact the Coshocton Hospital Speech Department at 623-4143.