Meeting the Needs of Persons with Dementia: Challenges Facing Speech-Language Pathologists

Abstract

Persons with dementia may be considered the fastest growing clinical population within the speech-language pathologist's scope of practice. In Canada, there are currently 546,000 individuals living with dementia. In order to provide adequate and ethical care to this growing population, the field of speech-language pathology faces some challenges. In this paper, two challenges are presented. The first challenge concerns the lack of speech-language pathology services available for persons with dementia. The second challenge concerns the lack of education surrounding the need for speech-language pathology services for persons with dementia.