Speech therapy and psychological orientation program to families of brain injured patients

Abstract

Introduction: Language is responsible for one to interact with others, with the world and with himself/herself. Language disorders can cause losses to the individual in their family and social relationships. Objective: to develop and evaluate the Speech Therapy and Psychological Orientation Program to families of brain injured patients. Methods: It were invited to participate in the program all family members of patients treated in training course of adult language, at speech therapy clinic. The program was developed in the period from September to November 2010, with 21 family members in 9 meetings lasting 50 minutes each, being 3 with themes of speech therapy and 6 of psychology. In all the meetings were present the speech therapist and psychologist. Were used newsletters prepared by researchers. At the end of the meetings, a questionnaire was applied for a quantitative and qualitative evaluation of the program. Results: The questionnaire was responded by 18 family members, 100% said that the Orientation Program has met the expectations of the group, 89% have had the opportunity to transmit the issues discussed in that meetings to other family members and 83% the availability to participate in all meetings. Conclusion: The benefits of the program to the family members were detected, with emphasis on aspects about the topics covered.