Dhara - Building Sustainable Communication

  To create awareness and acceptance and to educate parents regarding the chaos that a child with Autism have difficulty with in their day to day life we from 'Dhara clinic' along with our clinical partner 'Freesia occupational therapy center' had organized a workshop for parents on 'Toilet training' in the month of April'19. As learning does not stop with few and it needs to reach all the parents we are summarizing the workshop in this blog.                     Dr. Karthik Rao,  Mch – Urology, DNB – Urology/ Genito – Urinary Surgery, MBBS,  Having completed his MS- General surgery from Father Muller Medical college , Mangalore where he topped his batch , he went on to complete his Mch urology from Govt Kilpauk Medical college which is one of the three premier government medical colleges in Chennai.  He spoke about  the 'Mechanisms of bladder and bowel control'. His presentation included the follow...

 In the intervention of children with Autism Spectrum disorders and other developmental disabilities the most recommended and evidence based approach is "ABA". Have you been wondering what it is? “ABA” stands for Applied Behavior Analysis. Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) is a scientific approach to understanding behavior. ABA refers to a set of principles that focus on how behaviors change, or are affected by the environment, as well as how learning takes place. “Applied”, as a characteristic of ABA, means that the focus is on behavior that improves the quality of life of the child and those around him or her.  The term "Behavior" refers to skills and actions needed to talk, play, and live. "Behavior" refers to all kinds of actions and skills (not just misbehavior). While these principles impact everyone each day, they can be "applied" systematically through interventions to help individuals learn and apply new skills in their daily lives.  ...

                       This year the 'Annual convention of Speech and Hearing professionals' was held on February 8th, 9th and 10th at NIMHANS Convention center Bengaluru. Experts from the field have shared the latest developments, current research findings, and contemporary intervention strategies. I must say it's a feast of knowledge. Couple of plenary sessions were very informative about the current trends and scope of practice in Speech Pathology. One among them was Skype session about 'The Social Communication Interventions for Adults with Autism in Post secondary Education and Employment settings presented by Dr. Shubha Kashinath, Associate professor and Interim Chair, Dept of Communicative Sciences & Disorders, CAL STATE university'.                        In the session she had stated that current statistics  show that 1 in 59 children ...

Speech and Language is not learnt instantly. It takes a year for a child to utter 1 meaningful word after receiving continuous stimulation and interaction with parents. Speech and Language development starts right from the womb. Fetuses can hear things, including speech in the womb. A study done by Dr. Lawrence and team from the University of Kensas, reveals a month before they are born, fetuses can distinguish between someone speaking to them in different languages.  “Research suggests that human language development may start really early  a few days after birth,” said Utako Minai, associate professor of linguistics and team leader for the study. “Babies a few days old have been shown to be sensitive to the rhythmic differences between languages. Previous studies have demonstrated this by measuring changes in babies’ behavior; for example, by measuring whether babies change the rate of sucking on a pacifier when the speech changes from one language to a different la...

'Communication' is the process of exchanging ideas, feelings, or thoughts between two or more people. This process happens both verbally and non - verbally. Studies explain that 93% of communication we do is through non - verbal mode, only 7% of it constitutes of verbal communication. Non-verbal communication comprises of gestures, facial expressions, body language, position of body, tone and pitch of voice etc. It includes different senses i.e touch, vision, hearing, taste and smell. Infants to adults learn from their environment from the inputs they receive from these senses. Hence it's a natural way of learning Speech and Language skills and skills related to other developmental areas. An infant or toddler understands that clap is an action related to a happy emotion through observation of facial expressions, body language and tends to repeat it whenever he/she feels happy. Hence it is not only verbal communication but also non-verbal communication accounts for learn...

From Infancy through childhood and beyond, children learn Speech, Language and other skills from their parents. These skills are learnt during their interaction with their parents through out the day. During this interaction , infants learn several skills through observation, exploration and analyzing the stimulus that is received. Parents act as moderators in guiding the infants to master their developmental milestones. For example, while babies are learning to put their first steps, parents slowly fade the support and encourage the child to walk independently. Similarly, in Speech and Language intervention parents play a major role in helping the children with Communication Disorders master the skills that has been targeted. Children with 'Communication disorders' on average receive 3 hours of therapy or intervention program per week from the professional, rest of the time they will be in the company of their parents (excluding the school timings). Parents come in cont...