How Can Virtual Feeding Sessions Help My Child Eat Better?

Speech therapy can target a variety of needs across the lifespan: articulation, expressive language, receptive language, fluency, voice, social language, and feeding; just to name a few. And speech therapy is a crucial part of many people’s lives.

• 5-10% of Americans have a communication disorder
• Approximately 5% of children have noticeable speech disorders
• Approximately 116,000 newborn infants are discharged from short-stay hospitals with a diagnosis of feeding problems
• ARFID is estimated to affect approximately 5% of the general pediatric population and 1.5-13.8% in children between the ages of 8 and 18 years

While in-person has been the only option for a long time, virtual therapy is becoming increasingly more and more popular and has been found to be just as effective as in-person therapy. Here are a few benefits of virtual therapy sessions with your Speech Language Pathologist: 

1. Travel time – Virtual therapy means less time driving back and forth between your home and clinic and therefore less money spent on gas or tolls, plus you’re not limited by your location (such as if you’re living in a rural location and a Speech Pathologist isn’t nearby or if you’re looking for a specialist that doesn’t live in your nearby community).
2. More flexibility with scheduling – Being able to log in at home means that you can easily plan around school hours, nap time, etc. without having to consider travel time. It can also mean that you don’t need to take time off school or work to make it to your appointment at 4:00pm.
3. Increased convenience – No need to pack up several items (diaper bags, toys, tools) for therapy, everything is at your fingertips! I don’t know about you, but I ALWAYS forget something when I’m headed to an appointment. 
4. Increased opportunities for parent and family coaching – Therapy isn’t a magic trick; parent and family coaching is a crucial component to seeing feeding progress and virtual therapy helps ensure that parents don’t miss out on important information. Virtual therapy easily allows for increased opportunities for parent and family coaching and involvement throughout sessions – mom, dad, grandparents, siblings – they all play a role. 
5. It’s more comfortable – Often, adapting to a new environment can be quite stressful for a child. Virtual therapy means omitting this stress since they’re staying in their own home. And for older kids with feeding concerns, your therapist is often engaging in talk therapy, which is not “hands on,” making it easy for these sessions to be completed virtually. Many teens are very comfortable participating in a virtual model and are already used to this format. 
6. Easy carry-over – When you’re at home, you and your child are using their highchair and utensils for feeding therapy or their toys for speech therapy, allowing for an easy transition to working on the same skills at home. You won’t get stuck in the “s/he will do that in therapy but won’t do that at home with me!” situation. 

Kelly is an SLP and a feeding specialist. If you have questions, please reach out to Kelly at Picky Eaters Online. She can answer your questions about feeding therapy, speech therapy, virtual therapy, and your child’s or teen’s specific needs. Contact Kelly and Picky Eaters Online at kelly@pickyeatersonline.com or check out her website at https://pickyeatersonline.com/ to book a free consultation.

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Resources: 
https://www.asha.org/about/press-room/quick-facts/
https://www.asha.org/practice-portal/clinical-topics/pediatric-feeding-and-swallowing/#collapse_1