Many diseases can affect a patient's ability to understand others and express themselves. Speech therapy can help people who are not able to make speech sounds or cannot speak clearly.

Speech therapists also work with people who stutter, have fluency and rhythm problems, inappropriate pitch, or harsh voice and speech quality problems. Patients with the following conditions can often be helped with speech therapy.
 

• Developmental delay in speech and / or language (with / without hearing impairment)

• Difficulty in communicating basic needs / wants (inc. auditory comprehension and verbal expression)

• Swallowing difficulty (at risk for silent aspiration when drinking / eating)

• Traumatic Brain Injury, Stroke, or other neurological conditions

• Learning difficulty / disability

• Facial paralysis, decreased labial / lingual musculature

• Naming difficulty / acquired language disorders / dyspraxia post-stroke

• Voice problem (including organic / functional / psychogenic)

• Stuttering (Dysfluency of speech)