Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences, University of Texas at Austin 
Background: I have an undergraduate degree in Music Composition from the State University of New York, and became interested in speech-language pathology while teaching private music lessons. I completed a (Spanish) bilingual certification at Columbia University and spent four years working as an SLP with medically fragile adolescent bilinguals in a New York City Dept. of Ed. vocational transition program. Many of these culturally and linguistically diverse individuals were AAC users. I also worked in an outpatient clinic at New York-Presbyterian hospital in Brooklyn. In each of these settings, I became very interested in how SLPs’ interprofessional collaboration on health care teams can significantly improve access to patient-centered care for communication-vulnerable individuals.
Current Interests: My current research interest is investigating the evidence base for AAC interventions in critical and acute care settings, specifically with mechanically ventilated and tracheostomy communication-vulnerable patients. Improving patient-provider communication in health care with better tools and expert implementation is an urgent imperative to meet current person-centered care standards. I’m also interested in how university clinics can better provide early access to AAC for adults with neurodegenerative conditions through community partnerships.
Dissertation Chair: Dr. Rajinder Koul
Sample Presentation/Publication: My collaborator Cissy Cheng and I presented a poster at ASHA 2021, “Assessing healthcare provider perspectives on effective communication and skill training in ICU settings” which reported perspectives on patient-provider communication with nonspeaking patients in the ICU. A majority of healthcare providers reported a need for more effective communication strategies with nonspeaking patients, and indicated that on-demand training modules to help providers select and utilize evidence-based AAC strategies is a crucial need in ICU settings.
https://slhs.utexas.edu/research/augmentative-and-alternative-communication-lab Coming soon: AACLabAustin.org
Presentation Topic: AAC interventions in acute and critical care settings with mechanically ventilated and tracheostomy patients
Discussion Topic(s): Some challenges noted in the scoping review I conducted were the barriers to producing high-quality evidence for effective AAC in the chaotic setting of intensive care, and the need for improved interprofessional collaboration to study the efficacy of communication interventions in the ICU.