Stockport’s speech and language therapist (SLT) services have supported a young girl in finding her voice with the latest technology.
Hester Lynch, a 10-year-old girl from Heaton Moor, suffers from Gatad 2B syndrome, a rare neurological disorder.
Symptoms of the syndrome include intellectual difficulties and severe speech impairment, which has harshly affected her life up until recently.
Hester is described as a friendly, lively and enthusiastic girl but had difficulty making friends as she struggled to communicate in a way people understood clearly.
The SLT team have supported Hester and her family for numerous years and in 2016 Hester was provided with a Proloquo2Go after a referral to the ACE centre North.
The Proloquo is a programme used via an iPad that holds a series of icons and words that are tapped to make the system say the words.
Speech and language therapist Pamela Barr said: “It’s been marvellous to be able to give Hester a voice, and we’re using it to help us give a voice to many other children too.”
With this device Hester can now make herself understood much more clearly, allowing her to expand her friendship group and improve her own spoken language.
Hester’s mother, Lucy Powis, said: “Hester’s speech has come on in leaps and bounds. She’s a lot more confident in herself now.”
The Stockport SLT team provides support for over 2000 children and, with the help of the Ace Centre charity iPads, with the Proloquo programme installed, have been supplied to the team and other SLT teams across Greater Manchester.
