While some people need to learn to stop speaking so much, the reality is most people need to learn to talk. Some people help others learn to express themselves. They’re called speech pathologists and they serve an important societal need.

Every Day is Different

In general, every single day in the life of speech pathologist is different. This is why so many people love the profession. Getting a masters in speech-language pathology can open doors and offer a chance to make a difference in someone’s life. For many speech pathologists, each day has a certain rhythm they follow.

The process of any day all begins depending on where the pathologist is employed. A speech pathologist may be employed in so many varied settings. Some work in schools helping children speak out and communicate better with teachers. Others work in hospitals with patients who might have suffered a problem such as a stroke. The common thing that unites all days in this profession is that each professional works directly with patients. They are on the front lines of medical care.

Reviewing Patients

The speech pathologist may be assigned any number of patients. Some are assigned patients each day while others may follow a few directly over the course of time. Many practices combine ongoing patient care with seeing new patients as they arrive in the setting. A pathologist may also have a specific specialty. Some choose to with gerontology patients while others confine their practice to young children only. The kind of patients dictates the course of the daily flow of their personal practice. For example, someone who is working in a school may work with more than one school in a given district. This means they travel from one school to the next and see kids in an office set aside for this purpose.

The Overall Day

Any day in the life is about caring for patients. Speech pathologists are taught how to recognize medical conditions that make it hard for people to speak. Conditions like aphasia can be diagnosed with their help. Once a patient has a diagnosis, the pathologist can develop a course of help that is tailored to that person’s specific skills and addresses any kind of ongoing deficits. This is one of the things that speech pathologists love so much about their jobs. They get to be on the cutting edge of technology and see it implemented. That’s a wonderful feeling and why so many people come to work. During the course of the day, they will often be called on to engage in many parts of the process. They will often have one part of the day where they are asked to provide an assessment for any newly admitted patients. Then it’s off to fill out lots of boring paperwork. The second half is spent working with existing patients.

A master’s degree in this field can be an excellent way to earn a living and be a good person.