The duration of speech therapy sessions can vary greatly depending on the patient's capacity and objectives. Most patients visit the clinic once or twice a week for about an hour, but the actual treatment time will depend on the number of sound errors that are being addressed in the treatment plan. A 2002 study concluded that significant advances in speech clarity require approximately 14 hours of therapy, on average. Many children who need speech therapy have an articulation or phonological processing disorder.
The typical time to correct a difference in speech is 15 to 20 hours, and the typical frequency for joint treatment is twice a week for 30-minute sessions. Based on this information, it could be assumed that if the disorder were mild to moderate, if the child attended treatment consistently and families did their homework between sessions, the total duration of treatment could be about four to five months. It's important to understand the factors that influence the duration of speech therapy sessions. Most of the time, parents can watch a session here and there to observe, learn, and use the strategies that are taught to their child in the session. It will usually take at least a couple of weeks for the SLP to establish a working relationship with your child and develop a routine.
After that time, the therapist should inform you of the high-priority objectives and give you instructions on how you can help and reinforce the progress achieved in the sessions. This tends to minimize distractions and allows the therapist to fully immerse the child in the therapeutic process. Most of the time, there should be some way to observe a session here and there, regardless of the environment, so that parents can observe, learn, and use the strategies that are taught to their child at home. Therefore, it's quite difficult to predict with certainty how long your child's speech therapy will last. If you ask your SLP this question and receive something like a definitive answer, then you may need to keep looking for an SLP to administer speech therapy.
