Amanda Wilde (Host): Welcome to Arbor Health and Life Podcast. I'm Amanda Wilde. My guest is Speech Language Pathologist Lynn Murphy. Today's conversation provides insights into understanding speech language pathology. Welcome to the podcast, Lynn.

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Thank you. Glad to be here.

Host: Glad to have you. You have been decades in this field practicing since 1996. What inspired you to become a speech language pathologist?

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Well, after completing a degree in communications, I was working as a counselor in a university and just took a class, just on my personal time in communication disorders, and I was intrigued by the loss or decreased ability to communicate. Which of course in my field in counseling, it was extremely important skill to have to communicate well. So I found that to be intriguing as a disability and an area that I wanted to help people with.

Host: Now, what is the difference between speech issues and language issues?

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Well, speech issues relate more to the production. So it's the motor component of communication, how we make things work to say what we want to say. Speech can also involve, of course, voice, resonance, prosody, inflection, rhythm, just all the different motor components of how we put together what we want to say.

Language relates more to our thought processing, putting our thoughts into words, both verbal and written communication, and also the comprehension or understanding of words and how words are put together to make meaning, and again, involves both spoken and written communication.

Host: So with that in mind, what are some of the conditions you help people with in your practice?

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: A wide variety of conditions. The first thing we kind of think of is stroke, people who have aphasia, which is a language disorder or dysarthria, which is more of a speech disorder and production disorder following a stroke, brain injury, weaknesses due to other injuries or illnesses that they may have experienced. And also some progressive conditions such as Parkinson's disease or multiple sclerosis, dementia. There's a wide variety of reasons why somebody might have a communication problem or disability. A lot of times we need to kind of figure out a balance between compensating for the disability or remediation, how to help it get better and improve.

And so that kind of depends on the condition and, the etiology of why they have a communication impairment in the first place.

Host: So what a wide variety of challenges in your practice. Can you talk a little more about, I mean, when you mentioned stroke and brain injury, how do cognitive issues tie into speech and language therapy? Can you give an example?

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: When we talk about conditions like that, it's important to kind of figure out, whether it is more of a language issue, the words and how to put the words together, or a speech issue, a production issue, or more of a cognitive and thought processing. Does it involve memory? Does it involve concentration and attention? Planning and organization of what we want to say. There are some overlaps, of course, between language and cognition, but then there are some differences too. And it, it helps to guide how we work on the difficulty to see if it's really a language-based issue or is it more of a cognitive and thought processing issue.

Host: So you really have to do some detective work and then come up with a very individualized plan. You also work on the motor side with people who have swallowing issues. I understand that's a real chunk of what speech language pathology handles. Can you talk about that work? Can you describe what it is?

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Yes. So similar to speech and voice, that involves more the production or more the movement, the motor function. And so they actually often go along with speech and voice issues as well, because we use all the same parts for speaking that we do for swallowing, but in very different ways. For swallowing, we take a look at the different phases of swallowing. Is it an oral issue? Is it more kinda lips and tongue and chewing and transporting and moving around the food and liquid in our mouth? Or once it reaches more the throat, is it more of a pharyngeal issue or a throat issue with queezing, moving the food bolus down or airway closure, which a lot of people don't realize.

Our airway is open so we can breathe and talk, but when we swallow, we actually have to close and protect our airway to swallow. So there's a lot of different motor components to swallowing, that can affect the safety and the efficiency of how someone is able to eat and drink and maintain their hydration and nutrition needs.

Host: Now when you commence with these therapies, is there a beginning, middle and end, or are people chronic or and how do you rate how successful you are being?

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Yeah, that's a really good question. We have conditions that have occurred such as a stroke or a brain injury, or an illness or an accident, and then you move forward. But then we also do have the more progressive conditions that you're kind of planning for changes over time and possible worsening of a condition. And how do we manage the changes that are to come and work toward the future? And so it really depends on the background and the etiology or what has happened to create the problem. It's hard to know when you've reached the completion of a therapy. So working very closely with the patient on what their goals are.

And in a lot of times it's helping to, kind of accept what has happened and that we can't change that, but working toward getting as independent and functional as possible with what they're now dealing with. And sometimes it's full recovery and sometimes it's not. But helping to teach ways to compensate and to accept maybe some changes in abilities and levels and being okay with that can also be a success.

Host: Yeah, I've heard that when there is a stroke or something where a part of your brain is damaged, that you may find another way to do the things that part of the brain did, but it's a way around rather than the natural way you originally learned that. And it sounds like that's what you're doing with a lot of this work as well.

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Yes, oftentimes, I mean, we, we hear about neuroplasticity or the ability for the brain to continuously learn and change, and so sometimes you may not be able to retrain the part that was affected, but your brain is able to learn a different way to get around it and to adjust so that you can still obtain a good outcome where you can still do some of the things, but maybe in a little bit different way.

Host: So this is all about maintaining your highest quality of life and probably is life changing in some cases. Are there any particular success stories?

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Well, I, you know, sometimes when I work with people who have had different employment experiences or different, you know, they were gainfully employed and very active in their lives. So just having people kind of get back to doing something that they identify themselves with, you know, that was just such a big part of their lives in the past.

And helping them resume it, even in a modified way can be very, very, enriching and, just make you feel like, you've really helped somebody in their life. I think communication has always been really important to me, and I find that having people connect back with who they were before and the people that they interacted with before, getting back to their independence, at the highest level that they can with their former self.

Host: Right. Just gives you such a sense of normalcy.

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Yeah. Yeah.

Host: Well, Lynn, thank you so much for sharing your expertise and guiding us through the fascinating world of speech and language pathology.

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Oh, absolutely. I think communication is just such a huge part of who we are and, I really have enjoyed spending many years helping people communicate to their fullest.

Host: Yes, you have had many years and here's wishing you many more.

Lynn Murphy, MA/CCC-SLP: Thank you very much.

Amanda Wilde (Host): to learn more, visit my arbor health.org/rehab or call 3 6 0 4 9 6 36 50

Host: If you found this podcast helpful, please share it on your social channels and check out the entire podcast library for additional topics of interest. Thanks for listening to Arbor Health and Life Podcast.

Amanda Wilde (Host): To learn more, visit, uh, to learn more, visit my arbor health.org/rehab or call 3 6 0 4 9 6 36 50. I'll do it one more time. To learn more, visit my arbor health.org/rehab or call 3 6 0 4 9 6 36 50. I hope that's okay. I did. I didnt.