Developing a Parent’s Early Telehealth Program for Stuttering Children Younger Than 4 Years and Assessing Its Validity

Abstract

Introduction: Recent studies suggest that treatment should be begun immediately in children who have recently started to stutter. The purpose of this study was to design a telehealth application for parents of young children who stutter. It is an evidence-based treatment that can be administered from an early age compared to the current “wait and see” approaches.
 Materials and Methods: This research involved a qualitative content analysis. At first, a comprehensive review was performed on different well-established therapeutic programs, and their main therapeutic components were extracted via several sessions held by our focused group. Subsequently, six independent stuttering experts and five parents of stutter children were asked to rate the program’s items regarding its content and face validities by a 5-point Likert questionnaire. Finally, the entire program was used to form an easy to use, family- friendly software.
 Results: Seven therapeutic principles and five common factors were extracted from all available well-established stuttering treatment programs. They were designed in an easy to use software program. The final telehealth program was found to have a high face and content validities.
 Conclusion: This program might be used in future clinical practice for stuttering children under the age Four. However, its efficacy has yet to be examined.