Prevalence Versus Evidence: A Closer Look at the Research Available for Serving Children Exposed to Maltreatment and a Response to Hyter's Call for Trauma-Informed Care.

Abstract

In an October 2021 post of The ASHA LeaderLive, Dr. Yvette Hyter emphasized the need for trauma-informed services for children exposed to maltreatment in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Inspired by her call, we discuss how the pandemic created a high-risk context for maltreatment, the speech-language pathologists' (SLPs') role in prevention and intervention, reflect on the gap in evidence for maltreatment within empirical journals aimed at the speech-language pathology audience, and reiterate Hyter's call for trauma-informed care as a guide for clinicians serving children exposed to maltreatment. We searched for empirical evidence within journals aimed at SLPs focused on maltreatment to get an estimate of the available research. For comparison, we consulted the same journals for the number of publications covering other risk factors or conditions with similar impacts on communication skills but with lower prevalence rates. Compared to other risk factors or conditions with lower prevalence rates, the disparity between the evidence aimed at SLPs and the prevalence of childhood maltreatment was difficult to ignore. Given the current circumstances, we encourage clinicians to seek information about the communicative effects of exposure to maltreatment beyond journals aimed specifically at speech-language pathologists, stress the need for trauma-informed care instruction during graduate schooling, increase awareness of our role in preventative care, and call for more research on intervention services tailored specifically for children exposed to maltreatment.