Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Rehabilitation and Assistive Technologies
Date Submitted: Mar 8, 2019
Open Peer Review Period: Mar 11, 2019 - Mar 15, 2019
Date Accepted: May 29, 2019
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
mHealth and Speech-Language Pathologists: A Pediatric Focus
ABSTRACT
Background:
Technology use in pediatric therapies is increasing with no research available focusing on how pediatric speech-language pathologists (SLPs) use technology.
Objective:
This survey aimed to determine if and to what extent pediatric SLPs are using mobile applications, for what purposes, and for which populations, and to identify gaps in available technology, in order to provide guidance for future technology development.
Methods:
Pediatric SLPs completed an online survey containing five sections: demographics, overall use, use in assessment, use in intervention, barriers, and future directions.
Results:
Clinical mobile app use was analyzed for 485 pediatric SLPs. Most (80.30%) pediatric SLPs reported using technology < 50% in their clinical work. Pediatric SLPs are currently using apps for intervention (36.11%), clinical information (21.81%), parent education (13.67%), assessment (11.95%), client education (9.77%), and other (4.98%). Cost (34.07%) and lack of an evidence base (26.67%) were the most frequently reported barriers.
Conclusions:
A majority of pediatric SLPs are using mobile apps less than 50% of the time in a pediatric setting and use them more during intervention compared to assessment. While pediatric SLPs are hesitant to add to screen time, they would like more apps developed that are supported by research and are less expensive. Implications for future research and app development are discussed.
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Copyright
© The authors. All rights reserved. This is a privileged document currently under peer-review/community review (or an accepted/rejected manuscript). Authors have provided JMIR Publications with an exclusive license to publish this preprint on it's website for review and ahead-of-print citation purposes only. While the final peer-reviewed paper may be licensed under a cc-by license on publication, at this stage authors and publisher expressively prohibit redistribution of this draft paper other than for review purposes.