West Texas A&M University breaking down communication barriers
AMARILLO, Texas (KFDA) - West Texas A&M’s communication disorder department is using new technology to better help students and patients advance their communication skills.
The clinic’s staff is pleased to now have state of the art equipment to help their patients achieve their communication goals much more efficiently.
“We have a state of the art audio logical suite, which our department chair Dr. Cross uses to test hearing to be able to determine if a hearing aid is a good fit," says Zeth Collom, pathologist at West Texas A&M Speech and Hearing Clinic. “We also use communication devices, so from a communication disorder standpoint, technology can be anything from a piece of paper and pen, to an i-Pad app or a high communication device.”
The clinic also just recently purchased a new card system to add to the list of new technology.
“We offer the picture exchange communication system which is an evidence based augmentative communication strategy that looks at using pictures and images to exchange for communication instead," says Collom.
Collum says human communication is a medical term, and WTAMU uses their new technology to treat patients as medical patients.
“One thing is that speech language pathology and audiology are both health science professions," says Collom. “They align themselves kind of in the middle of participation and an educational model as well as a medical model,” he says. “Communication is all neurological, and the most important and vital organ for communication is in fact the brain, whether it’s hearing, speech, voice, reading, writing, and so with that, we’ve had to grow as a profession to use more medical style and instrumental assessment measures.”
Not only is the speech and hearing clinic growing at WTAMU, but the entire educational department continues to grow as well.
“The field is growing. It’s one of those jobs that continues on a growth pattern, and so we are seeing lots of students apply to our program as well as programs across the country right now," says Darla Marcear, clinical coordinator at West Texas A&M Speech and Hearing Clinic.
The Chair of the Communication Disorders Department also says the speech and hearing clinic is helping students on campus with communication disorders help ease their process of getting their degree.
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