10 September 2024

New data suggests eight out of 10 children who receive speech and language therapy show improved outcomes

Now that the summer holidays are over for another year and children across the country have gone back to school, we’ve published new data about children and young people in the UK who are receiving speech and language therapy.

Our data, collected from 49 providers across the UK who are using the RCSLT Online Outcome  (ROOT) Tool, suggests that:

  • Most children who receive speech and language therapy have improved outcomes: 79% of children and young people in our dataset improved in one or more of the following areas in association with speech and language therapy:
    • Extent of speech and/or language needs
    • Ability to communicate
    • Participation in daily activities such as education or social activities.
  • Most children and young people receiving speech and language therapy are at primary school: 54% of the children and young people in our dataset are primary school-aged (5-11 years). Only 14% are aged 12-18.

Our data suggests that the majority of children and young people receiving speech and language therapy are of primary school-age. Pie chart showing Primary school age 54%, Secondary school age 14%, pre school age 32%

  • More boys than girls receive speech and language therapy: 69% of the children and young people in our dataset are boys.
  • The three most common types of need for children and young people receiving speech and language therapy are:
    • Developmental language disorder / difficulties (30%)
    • Speech sound disorder / difficulties (21%)
    • Autism (9%) .

 Our data suggests that the three most common types of need for children and young people receiving speech and language therapy are: 1 Developmental Language Disorder/Difficulties, 2. Speech Sound Disorders/Difficulties, 3. Autism. Source RCSLT Online Outcome Tool, based on data from 49 providers from across the UK

About the RCSLT Online Outcome Tool

The RCSLT Online Outcome Tool (ROOT) supports speech and language therapists with collecting and collating outcomes data using Therapy Outcome Measures (TOMs).

As well as monitoring outcomes for individual service users, the ROOT also aggregates data across a speech and language therapy service and generates reports. These reports can be used by speech and language therapists to inform clinical decision-making and offer the potential to demonstrate the impact of speech and language therapy interventions for individual service users and cohorts of service users.

Aggregated reports can be used to help with service evaluation and quality assurances purposes, and to inform those funding speech and language therapy services.

The ROOT database currently contains data on over 90,000 speech and language therapy episodes from 85 providers across the UK working with children, young people and/or adults. Visit our webpages for more information about the ROOT.