Our Speak To Me Therapists Are Loving Teletherapy

If your new to teletherapy, welcome! 

Also we welcome you to this new, crazy reality where parents are expected to be their child’s full time carer, nurturer, playmate, work full-time, be their child’s teacher and now be their child’s speech language therapist too.

With the introduction of Covid 19 into New Zealand society we have all had to adjust to a completely new way of life, which has meant dinner parties online, friend catch ups online, kids play dates online, story time with Grandma and Grandad online, school online, doctor’s appointments online and don’t forget about online speech language therapy! 

It also meant that when we went into lockdown, us Speak To Me therapist’s had to find a space around the house to set up a make shift teletherapy office. Both Gemma and I were thrust into teletherapy fairly fast where we took up the challenge, not wanting to let our wonderful clients down, and sharpened up our teletherapy skills with a new telehealth platform (thank you Cliniko!), new online games and resources, knowledge sharing with speech language therapists both nationally and internationally, as well as research and professional learning into the area of telehealth. We have really loved it and more than anything enjoy being able to see the gorgeous faces of the kids on our caseload every week. We have only had a few interruptions from our end with children’s tantrums (our own kids) and a few regular bust in’s into the session. Needless to say our husbands have received a few interesting texts: “Please come and get the child knocking on the other side of the door” “Can you please put a movie on for them!” “Are they still crying”. Maybe without so many pleases. 

At Speak To Me we use a teletherapy platform called Cliniko (this is also our booking and invoice software system) which is created specifically for telehealth. This means that it is HIPPA compliant; it has been encrypted and developed for maximum security and confidentiality. 

We have been seeing children of all ages for teletherapy. We make sure each session is individually tailored for your child, bringing some of their favourite games, toys and activities into each session. We use screen sharing which means we can share online games, use BOOM cards, share interactive PDF’s, share interactive Powerpoint games and share our iPad applications. This gives us a huge variety of resources to use with your child to achieve set goals. We sometimes even read books and sing and dance! Some of our clients email us their online learning curriculum for that week and we try to incorporate similar activities to support their online learning. 

Your therapist may ask you to print out and bring some resources to the session, or we may ask you to bring a favourite toy or book. It’s always fun when the kids want to show us some of their favourite things! 

When it is advised and safe to do so, we will open up our clinic to our clients. However we will have a one in one out policy, where one client leaves before another arrives, giving our therapist time to sanitize between clients. We will also have strict contact logs on site. We will regularly consult with the schools we operate out of to check when they will be happy to have outside professionals onsite, if this process remains delayed we will conduct teletherapy with your child at their school. 

We have been having so much fun and hope to connect with you online soon! Please give your therapist a call to discuss trialling teletherapy for your child, or if your new here please email enquiries@speaktome.co.nz.