Between October 2014 and May 2015 I was fortunate to have the opportunity to work as a Speech and Language Therapist in Accra, Ghana, providing support to various centres who provide services to children with speech, language and communication difficulties. During the eight months I focused on training and support for staff within the centres as well as support for parents and the children themselves.
Between December 2017 and February 2018 I returned to Ghana to provide clinical education support for three Speech and Language Therapy MSc students from the University of Ghana. It was a hugely rewarding experience to mentor, support and assess the three students. I'm pleased to report that all three graduated in the summer of 2018 and are currently working alongside nine of their fellow graduates in various posts across Ghana. A mentoring project and the British Ghanaian Partnerhsip was born in order to provide ongoing support to our new colleagues in Ghana alongside existing SLT staff. The project provides a distance mentoring session once a month as well advice on specific clinical issues. I benefited from funding from MAITS (Multi Agency International Training and Support) charitable funds in order to travel to Ghana for a third time in February 2019 to provide a workshop on AAC and additional CPD opportunities. I look forward to planning my next visit and intend to maintain links with my overseas colleagues.
If you're interested in learning more about the exciting developments in the SLT profession in Ghana please do get in touch!