I'm back
As some of you may have noticed from recent Twitter activity, I'm back!
To give you the short version, I took an interruption in studies after my younger brother contracted encephalitis last year. Maybe if I'm up to it one day I'll write a post on knowing his diagnosis and attending lectures on encephalitis, cerebral palsy and pragmatic communication, as well as trying to convince people that it might be better if they didn't feed him upside-down, in bed. In fact, maybe I'll write a book!
Anyway, with him making slow and steady progress, I have now returned to my course with only an Extended Case Study on receptive language intervention standing between me and my Master's degree certification. I would like to mention at this point that the support of academic staff from Newcastle University Language Pathology dept. has been outstanding and I owe them my eternal gratitude.
Newcastle SLT Journal Club
So, in picking up where I left off, I am hosting the first Newcastle SLT Journal club tomorrow, along with co-leaders, Kate Mason and Yvonne Murray. The club is open to SLTs, student SLTs and other AHPs and runs on the premise that we all have something to bring to the table when it comes to evidence based practice.
This week we are focusing on Communication Partner Training and critically reviewing the following two articles:
- Matched and mismatched appraisals of the effectiveness of communication strategies by family caregivers of persons with Alzheimer’s Disease (Savundranayagam & Orange, 2014)
- Communication Partner Training in Aphasia: A Systematic Review (Simmons-Mackie, Raymer, Armstrong, Holland & Cherney, 2010).
My aim is to update the blog on articles discussed in these meetings, so watch this space if you love a bit of evidence...
You can join the club here and/or have a nose at forthcoming events on our Facebook page
References
Savundranayagam, M.Y., & Orange, J.B. (2014). Matched and mismatched appraisals of the effectiveness of communication strategies by family caregivers of persons with Alzheimer’s Disease. International journal of language and communication disorders, 49(1), Jan-Feb, pp 49-59.
Simmons-Mackie N, Raymer, A., Armstrong, E., Holland, A. & Cherney, L.R. (2010). Communication Partner Training in Aphasia: A Systematic Review. Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, 91(12), 1814-1837.
