The RCSLT Outcomes Project

 

The RCSLT Outcomes Project

The Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT) has embarked on an innovative and ambitious project to support speech and language therapists with delivering and measuring effective outcomes.

In 2013, RCSLT members devised a list of criteria to identify an existing outcome measurement tool to enable comparable, valid and reliable data to be gathered from across the profession. Over 60 outcome measures, frameworks and systems commonly used by speech and language therapists (SLTs) were appraised against this set of criteria. Therapy Outcome Measures for Rehabilitation Professionals 3rd Edition (TOMs, Enderby and John, 2015) was selected as the ‘best fit’.

TOMs scales address four dimensions of an individual in line with the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (WHO, 2007).

·       Impairment – the severity of the presenting difficulty/condition

·       Activity – the impact of the difficulty on the individual’s level of independence

·       Participation – impact on levels of social engagement and autonomy

·       Wellbeing – impact on mental and emotional wellbeing

In 2015, the RCSLT Council approved the development of a proof of concept online tool to support collection of TOMs data.

Proof of concept pilot

The RCSLT Online Outcome Tool (ROOT) is a stand-alone system that has been developed to collect and collate outcomes data. Clinicians can use the tool to record and monitor outcomes for individual service users and access reports that show change over time in association with SLT interventions.

Users of the tool can input TOMs data for service users directly into the ROOT via a web-based application, or upload data that has been extracted from databases within existing electronic systems. The ROOT collects data about the individual’s age, gender and diagnoses and TOMs ratings at different points in time.

The ROOT aggregates data recorded by an SLT service and generates reports. These can be used by service managers to evaluate the outcomes delivered and support them with monitoring outcomes for specific clinical groups and evidencing the impact of SLT. Filters can be applied to the reports to drill down to specific clinical groups at the required level for data analysis and reporting.

Adult and paediatric SLT services across the UK are currently piloting the use of the ROOT, and the software is being developed in response to their feedback.

Project evaluation

An independent evaluation of the proof of concept pilot has been undertaken with services that are piloting ROOT (November 2016). Feedback from the pilot sites has indicated that ROOT, particularly the aggregated data reports, offers the potential to add value to SLT services, but further time is required to embed the use of ROOT into services to allow further testing. It was suggested that the reports generated by ROOT offer the potential:

·       to identify gaps in service and impact of resources

·       to evaluate service delivery models and specific therapeutic approaches

·       to benchmark against other services (offering the opportunity to compare and improve services, and inform commissioners)

Following consideration of the findings and recommendations of the independent evaluation, the RCSLT Board of Trustees approved an extension of the pilot for a further six months (December 2016). This will provide an opportunity for the SLT services engaged with the pilot to gain more experience of using the ROOT to collect data and generate and test the reports. During this time, the following key areas will be explored:

·       Further development of ROOT

·       Method of data collection - Direct data entry / export method

·       Aggregated data reports and their uses

·       Development of resources e.g. to support use of the ROOT, information governance

Phase 2: Framing TOMs as part of other resources available

In parallel to the proof of concept pilot, the outcomes project steering group has recommended the initiation of ‘phase 2’ of the project. This phase of the project will include scoping the use of other sources of data and the available resources, outcome measures and frameworks that can be used alongside TOMs to evidence the impact of SLT services.

References

Enderby, P. and John, A. (2015) Therapy Outcomes Measures for Rehabilitation Professionals, Third edition, J&R Press Ltd.

Further information

Information about the RCSLT’s journey with outcome measurement is available on the RCSLT webpages https://www.rcslt.org/members/outcomes/RCSLT_outcomes_project and by contacting RCSLT Outcomes Project Officer kathryn.moyse@rcslt.org.

CATCH September Networking Lunch: a great turn out for Heidi Christensen's showcase

September saw the big re-launch of the CATCH Networking Lunch series following the summer break.

Held in a new venue within the Geography Department, close to our colleagues from Psychology and Human Communication Sciences, we enjoyed a talk from CATCH Academic Dr Heidi Christensen, Lecturer in Computer Science. Attendees networked over lunch with a sunny view of Western Park.

Taking us through her presentation: “Clinical applications of speech technology”, the audience learnt about the major challenges faced by Heidi and her fellow researchers in the field such as lack of data and the need for personalisation in speech recognition software. Dr Christensen also informed us about current project CloudCAST, which in partnership with AIAS Bologna (Italy), The University of the West Indies (Jamaica), and The University of Toronto (Canada), aims to place Clinical Application of Speech Technology in the hands of speech professionals. Another project discussed was homeService, a cloud-based, personalised system putting state-of-the-art speech recognition into the homes of users with physical impairments and disordered speech.

Closing to a number of questions from the network, it’s safe to say that Heidi’s showcase got everyone thinking.

Save the date: Friday 14th October, 12.15 - 14.00, The Diamond (workroom 3)

Join us at our October Networking lunch where we will be joined by:

●      New Professor in Health Services Research, Luc de Witte

●      Colleague from Research and Innovation Services, Rachel Dwyer

Following this we’ll be welcoming you to our new and improved Home Lab in the Innovation Centre. So come along to network over coffee and cake and see how you can make use of the facility in your research.

Professor Mark Hawley, Director of CATCH features in the current edition of the University of Sheffield’s Discover magazine

Speaking to the publication, Professor Hawley shared the centre’s aims: “Our goal is to help older people, people with disabilities and people with long-term health conditions to help themselves through the use of carefully designed and relevant technology,”

In order to achieve this goal, Professor Hawley takes us through how CATCH works with partners to develop these technologies. “What we specialise in is working with people who are eventually going to use these technologies so they can shape and influence the design of it. That way you get a product which is far more useable by them and is tailored to their needs as opposed to something that the technologist thinks is a great idea.”

Giving the reader a glimpse of the centre’s valuable work, Mark talks about the innovative research team that’s helping people to live independently and be able to self-manage their conditions through user friendly technology.

One current project developing a new assistive technology in the form of an app is explored in the article: “One such development is helping people with neurological disorders who have lost the ability to speak clearly. We are working on a computer program that uses speech recognition technology tailored to an individual, it understands what is being said when they try to speak and interprets this before speaking out a clearer version.” CATCH is currently working to get this technology commercialised. Find out more about the VIVOCA project on our website.

The Centre for Assistive Technology and Connected Healthcare (CATCH) brings healthcare scientists, engineers, psychologists, computer scientists, architects, and social scientists together in a creative hub that is changing lives for the better.

For more information about CATCH or information related to this article, please contact Laura Murray.

To discover other issues of the Discover Magazine please visit this website: Research at Sheffield Website

CATCH researchers take part in the UKspeech conference in Sheffield

140 speech technology researchers took part in the 5th national UKspeech conference on 20-21^st June 2016. This year, the conference was organised by the Speech and Hearing Group, Department of Computer Science at the University of Sheffield.

The conference had 60 posters, 5 oral presentation and 3 keynote speakers including Prof Phil Green talking about “Clinical Challenges of Speech Technology” and giving examples from many recent CATCH projects.

In addition, three CATCH-related PhD students presented their work:

• Zahra Ommani: “Spoken Dialogue System Assisting Older People”
• Sabah Al-Hameed: “Towards simple and robust audio-based detection of biomarkers for Alzheimer's disease”

• Bahman Mirheidari “Towards the Automatic Conversation Analysis of People with Dementia”

UK Speech Website: http://www.ukspeech.org.uk

Conference Website: http://ukspeech.dcs.shef.ac.uk

Written by Heidi Christensen, photos by Simon Butler