Multidisciplinary
Interprofessional practice (IPP) team
The interprofessional practice (IPP) team at Comprehensive includes Speech Language-Pathologists, Occupational Therapists, Physical Therapists, BCBAs, and behavior technicians/registered behavior technicians. The IPP team works on improving communication and collaboration between healthcare professionals, clients, families, and other stakeholders. By engaging in interprofessional practices and working together, we can help our clients achieve their goals.
FEEDING THERAPY
Our goal for the feeding therapy program at CSTC is to help children learn that eating is fun and to help them develop the skills to meet their full potential in becoming happy, healthy, and successful eaters. The focus on treatment may include adequate nutritional intake, expanding food variety, or the social aspect of eating. Barriers to feeding can range from medical to sensory based. At CSTC, we believe in using evidence-based approaches to create individually tailored feeding programs that meet a child’s unique needs. We have both speech-language pathologists and occupational therapists with training and experience in a variety of approaches, which allows us to match the child with the therapist(s) that can best address their needs
Speech Department
Pediatric Auditory (re)habilitation
The goal of our pediatric auditory (re)habilitation program is to help children with hearing loss maximize their listening and spoken language skills through the use of hearing technology (cochlear implants, hearing aids, or BAHAs). We are proud to have certified listening and spoken language specialists on staff who partner with families and caregivers to support maximal outcomes in therapy. Our specialists support a variety of communication approaches including total communication, auditory-oral, auditory-verbal therapy, and augmentative and alternative communication, depending on the child’s needs.
Aural Rehabilitation for Adults
When an adult receives a cochlear implant or hearing aids, they may notice that they continue to struggle with understanding speech in everyday conversations, noise, or on the phone. Through individualized therapy, adults can improve their ability to understand spoken language with their hearing technology. The goal of adult aural rehabilitation is to support the hearing and communication needs of adults and their communication partners.
ABA Department Program
Universal Porotcol
CSTC staff have recently completed training with FTF Behavioral Consulting to implement Universal Protocol within the ABA department, with the goal to train staff to use this protocol across all disciplines. Universal Protocol is created collaboratively across all staff members and can be tailored specifically to meet the needs of each individual client in order to decrease and/or eliminate crisis situations and prevent or minimize needs for physical management. Universal Protocol aims to increase joy for clients and create a happy and relaxed atmosphere for learning, as well as remove any events or interactions that may evoke problem behavior. We aim to teach our clients that staff at CSTC are supportive, engaged and ready to learn and play, and not adversarial. Universal Protocol is often enough to reduce or prevent challenging behaviors, but when increased intervention is needed, clients may move to Skills Based Treatment to help teach functional communication skills, tolerance of delayed or denied reinforcers, and other skill acquisition areas determined by the client, parents and stakeholders.
Parent-Provider Partnership
To decrease delay to behavioral health services, CSTC has designed a family-focused service delivery program called Parent-Provider Partnership. The purpose of this program is two-fold: (1) to connect families to services as quickly as possible while they are waiting for openings for focused or comprehensive ABA services, (2) increase family engagement and empowerment from the onset of treatment to maximize therapeutic benefit from treatment services. The Parent-Provider Partnership Program is an episodic model for family education / training. It is not a replacement for focused or comprehensive ABA services and should be considered a waitlist service.
Functional Assessment and Consultative Treatment Services (FACTS)
CSTC’s Functional Assessment and Consultative Treatment Services (FACTS) Program is an episodic program designed to help address challenging behaviors that present a risk of safety to self or others. The program uses an intensive telehealth caregiver training and coaching model designed to empower families with the skills to decrease their child’s unsafe behaviors and increase adaptive replacement behaviors. Services are provided remotely so challenges can be addressed in the place that matters the most - your home.
Interprofessional Practice Team
The interprofessional practice (IPP) team at Comprehensive includes Speech Language-Pathologists, Occupational Therapists, Physical Therapists, BCBAs, BCaBAs, and behavior technicians/registered behavior technicians. The IPP team works on improving communication and collaboration between healthcare professionals, clients, families, and other stakeholders. By engaging in interprofessional practices and working together, we can help our clients achieve their goals.
Training for School-Based Personnel
Comprehensive Speech and Therapy Center was invited to assist with a Michigan Department of Health and Human Services (MDHHS) funded grant to provide training support to school-based personnel through a subgrant with Acorn Behavioral Health. The goal of the grant funding for FY23 was to increase the number of trainers ready to give the training to local schools in the next fiscal year. Our staff completed a train-the-trainer series to provide training and coaching to school-based personnel. We have 7 BCBAs / QBHPs prepared to give these trainings in collaboration with school districts in Michigan.