2. INTRODUCTION
I had dual internships this summer at The Care Center
and Roger C. Peace Rehabilitation Hospital. At both
sites, I observed Speech-Language Pathologists and
assisted by organizing material, participating in
sessions, making crafts, creating activities, and
retrieving equipment. Through the limited time I
spent in my internships, I gained valuable knowledge
about this field. I have enjoyed the entire experience
and look forward to pursuing a career as a Speech-
Language Pathologist!
3. SITE ONE: THE CARE CENTER
The Care Center’s goal is to educate families on their
children’s diagnoses and help guide them to success.
The clinicians take any extra steps needed in order to
ensure that everything is being done to help each child
thrive.
4. DESCRIPTION
The Care Center is a
pediatric therapy center
located in Greenville,
South Carolina. The site
offers services in
occupational therapy,
physical therapy, speech
therapy, and aquatic
therapy.
The Care Center has two entrances, one for
traditional pediatric therapy and one for
aquatic therapy.
5. MY PLACEMENT
I interned in the speech therapy department. I
observed my preceptor, Emily, and the other two
Speech-Language Pathologists treat children with a
wide variety of diagnoses including delays, swallowing
disorders, apraxia, autism, sensory-based
communication difficulties, stuttering, social-skill
deficiencies, and expressive/receptive language
disorders. Treatment usually occurred in a small,
individual office. Depending on the child, the gym or
sensory room was sometimes used.
6. I took many children to the gym to swing or
jump on the trampoline during the first five
minutes of their sessions to calm them before
therapy. Co-treatments involving two or
more different types of therapists were often
performed in this room.
7. This is Emily’s office where most of her
treatment sessions were performed. I was
able to help when Emily had patients by
retrieving equipment that she needed from
her shelves or from other parts of the center.
At the end of some treatments, I helped the
child play speech games on an iPad while
Emily caught up on notes.
8. During this co-treatment, Emily worked with an
Occupational Therapist to help improve the patient’s
fine motor control and receptive/expressive language
skills. I contributed during this time by picking cards
to identify and stating two-step directions for the
child to follow.
9. This child was working to improve
intelligibility in his speech. I cut
out different worksheets to help
him that focused on producing /f/
and /s/ words in all positions.
Improvement of receptive language
skills was the main goal of this
patient. During treatment sessions, I
pointed to advanced body parts,
letters, and colors for him to identify.
10. This patient’s treatment involved the improvement of expressive
language skills. I helped Emily by singing familiar songs and
repeatedly using signs for “more” and “all done” during sessions.
11. The main goal for this patient was to
develop her expressive language skills.
I worked with Emily to come up with
games, songs, and activities that would
be helpful for the child.
This patient had a list of articulation
goals. I helped develop crafts and
activities that focused on /l/ blends.
12. Improvement of expressive language skills was the only
goal for this patient. I assisted in sessions by asking
simple questions and holding up cards with items on
them. The child would answer/identify by using his
13. PROJECTS
I completed four different
projects during my time at
The Care Center. They
include:
Comparison Paper
This paper is one of my main projects. It
compares and contrasts The Care Center
to Roger C. Peace. It will be available to
view on a separate tab of my portfolio.
Case Study: The Care Center
The case study for the Care Center looks
at a particular patient’s history,
diagnosis, and plan of action. This will be
available to view on a separate tab of my
portfolio.
Organization of Emily’s office space
• I organized Emily’s shelves and desk area to help
her easily locate activities to use in sessions.
Reward slips for good behavior
• The “button system” was used for children with
behavior issues. The patient was rewarded at the
end of each session if he/she maintained good
behavior. I created a variety of new reward slips.
14. SITE TWO: ROGER C. PEACE
The goals of Roger C. Peace Rehabilitation Hospital are
to provide the latest rehabilitative and technology
services with care and to help patients re-enter their
communities as smoothly and quickly as possible.
15. DESCRIPTION
Roger C. Peace is a
rehabilitation hospital
connected to Greenville
Memorial Hospital that
offers easy access
emergency care and
diagnostic services. The
site uses an
interdisciplinary team
approach consisting of
physical therapists,
occupational therapists,
and speech therapists.
Although Roger C. Peace
Rehabilitation Hospital is considered
an outpatient facility, it is directly
attached to Greenville Memorial
Hospital.
16. DESCRIPTION
On Tuesdays, my
preceptor, Danielle, and
I would spend the
mornings at Greenville
Radiology. A variety of
services are offered at
this location including
computed tomography,
mammography, and
ultrasound. I observed
Danielle while she
performed video
fluoroscopic swallowing
Greenville Radiology is part of the Greenville
Health System. Speech therapists from
Greenville Memorial Hospital travel to this
location whenever a video fluoroscopic swallow
exam is ordered for a patient.
17. MY PLACEMENT
I interned in the speech therapy department. My
preceptor, Danielle, and the other Speech-Language
Pathologists treated a wide variety of individuals for
communicative, cognitive, and swallowing difficulties.
I was able to observe video fluoroscopic swallowing
exams, evaluation and treatment of speech, language,
and cognitive impairments, treatments for voice and
motor speech disorders, rehabilitation for individuals
with tracheostomy, and patient and family education.
18. At Greenville Radiology, I helped Danielle prepare for swallowing
exams before each patient arrived. I sanitized the area and set up
the material necessary for the study. Typically, the patient would be
asked to swallow thin liquid, nectar-thick liquid, honey-thick liquid,
and pudding. I mixed all of these with barium so that the substances
being swallowed would be visible in the video X-ray.
19. After each exam, Danielle let me review the X-ray video and determine
whether or not I saw evidence of pulmonary aspiration. This condition can
happen when an individual swallows and material crosses the voice box into
the trachea instead of traveling down the esophagus. This occurrence is
sometimes extremely harmful and can lead to pneumonia. If pulmonary
aspiration occurred during the exams, Danielle would recommend a strained
diet or a percutaneous endoscopic gastronomy tube (PEG), depending on
severity. This picture shows a clear example of the appearance of pulmonary
aspiration, but usually the results are not nearly as evident.
20. One of my duties at Roger C. Peace was to develop
different word documents and home programs to
benefit the patients. For example, one man
requested daily logs to jog his memory and help
him stay on track with speech exercises. I created
this food and activity log to document his number
of effortful swallows and chin tuck swallows
throughout the day. I printed out several copies
and gave them to him in a folder.
21. I was frequently sent to the acute care
department at Greenville Memorial Hospital
to retrieve equipment for Danielle. This is a
VitalStim therapy machine that uses
neuromuscular electrical stimulation and
attaches to a patient with electrodes. It was
used on individuals with swallowing
difficulties.
Danielle and I used items such as money
and cards to treat patients who had goals of
improving problem solving, reasoning,
planning, attention, and memory.
Sometimes, Danielle would play games and
have conversations with patients and have
me tally the focused area mistakes of the
individual during the session.
22. I created a scavenger hunt as a project that was
used during a treatment session. This photo
shows Danielle explaining the scavenger hunt to
the patient. Danielle and I followed the patient
and assisted her whenever she got confused.
The hunt took approximately fifty minutes to
complete and will be helpful in the future in
determining a patient’s level of ability in multiple
areas.
23. One of several iPad apps
used during treatment
sessions, “BrainWorks” gave a
quantitative measurement of
the skill levels of patients.
They looked at their past
scores on certain games and
strived to improve that score
during the next session. The
purpose of this game was to
watch the paint drops fall in
the buckets and determine
which bucket had more
drops in the end. This
activity helped improve
attention skills, memory, and
even compensatory
strategies.
24. PROJECTS
I completed four different
projects while interning at Roger
C. Peace. They include:
Comparison Paper
• This paper is one of my main projects. It
compares and contrasts The Care Center to
Roger C. Peace. It will be available to view on a
separate tab of my portfolio.
Case Study: Roger C. Peace
• This case study looks at a particular patient’s
history, diagnosis, and plan of action and will be
available to view on a separate tab of my
portfolio.
Scavenger Hunt
• I created a scavenger hunt that can be
performed with patients during
sessions to help improve planning,
reading comprehension, intelligibility,
verbal expression, attention, memory,
receptive language, and auditory
comprehension.
Organization of Danielle’s Shelves
• I scanned several binders of material to
Danielle’s email so that she can replace
some excess paper with online
material. I then organized the shelves
and arranged the binders in order
according to diagnosis.
25. CONCLUSIO
N
Interning at The Care
Center and Roger C.
Peace Rehabilitation
Hospital was a
wonderful experience. I
acquired lots of helpful
information about
speech therapy and was
able to familiarize
myself with professional
work settings. The
differences in these two
locations helped me
understand the
CITATIONS
"Roger C. Peace Rehabilitation
Hospital - Greenville Health System."
Greenville Health System. Greenville
Health System, n.d. Web. 11 July
2016.
"Speech Therapy." The Care Center.
N.p., n.d. Web. 11 July 2016.
