Parental and Health Professionals' Awareness and their Roles in Speech-Language Therapy for Effective Intervention among Children with Communication Disorders in Selected Hospitals, Mwanza City, Tanzania

The study aimed to assess parental and health professionals’ awareness and their roles in speech and language therapy services in selected hospitals, Mwanza City, Tanzania. A study used both qualitative and quantitative approach with descriptive survey design. The study used sample size of 85 parents of children with communication disorders and 15 health professionals with total of 100 respondents. The study used closed ended questionnaires for parents, semi-structure interview for health professionals and document analysis to get respondents parents and their children in the selected hospitals. the study was conducted at Bugando Medical Center and Sekou-toure Regional Referral Hospital in Mwanza, city, Tanzania. The findings of the study revealed that the majority of parents in the selected hospitals were not aware of speech and language therapy services in the country and majority of them have very limited awareness of their roles in intervention process. Many of them don’t know individual professional concern with speech-language therapy and many parents raise awareness about speech-language problem when it is very late. It also revealed that many health professionals have limited awareness of the roles they play in speech and language intervention process.