FERPA or HIPAA?
This federal law primarily protects the privacy of student education records in schools.
FERPA
This process involves explaining the purpose, risks, benefits, and alternatives of an evaluation or treatment before the individual agrees to participate.
What is informed consent?
This refers to the ability to recognize and reflect on one's own cultural beliefs, assumptions, and biases.
What is cultural self-awareness?
A difference in language, dialect, accent, or communication style is not automatically evidence of this.
What is a communication disorder?
This involves using professional knowledge, evidence, client information, and clinical reasoning to make decisions.
What is clinical judgment?
An SLP working in a private outpatient clinic discusses a client's diagnosis with a friend at a restaurant. The friend does not know the client. Is this still a potential HIPAA concern and why?
What is yes?
Even if the friend does not know the client, the SLP is discussing protected health information in a public setting. Confidentiality may be compromised depending on the information shared.
An SLP receives a request from a teacher for information about a student's communication disorder. The teacher says, “I need to know everything in the report.” What should the SLP consider?
The SLP should share only information that is appropriate, relevant, and necessary for the teacher's educational responsibilities, while following applicable privacy laws and school policies.
An SLP tells a family, “You need to speak English at home so your child will learn English faster.” What cultural and linguistic concerns should the SLP consider?
The SLP should consider that:
Maintaining the home language does not inherently cause a language disorder.
Families should be supported in communicating in the language or languages most natural to them.
The SLP should avoid making unsupported assumptions about bilingual language development.
A family speaks a language the SLP does not speak. The SLP asks the child's 10-year-old sibling to interpret during the evaluation. What concerns might this raise?
Potential concerns include:
Accuracy and completeness of interpretation
Confidentiality
The child's emotional burden
Power dynamics within the family
The possibility that the child may filter or change information
Whether a qualified interpreter should be used
True or False: Using reflective practice to understand and accept clients' cultural backgrounds is a key component of culturally responsive intervention?
True.
A graduate student is completing clinical hours at a university clinic. The student wants to use a client's therapy video in a class presentation. The student's classmates are not involved in the client's care. What should the student consider before showing the video?
The student must consider privacy, confidentiality, informed consent, and institutional policies. The client should not be identifiable unless appropriate permission and authorization have been obtained.
A graduate clinician posts:
“Today was a hard day. My pediatric client with autism finally used a three-word sentence!”
No name, photograph, or location is included. Is this automatically acceptable?
No.
Students should consider whether the individual could still be identifiable based on the details, whether the post violates institutional policies, and whether confidential information is being shared.
A clinician believes they are culturally responsive because they “treat every client exactly the same.” Why might this approach be problematic?
Treating everyone identically may overlook differences in language, culture, communication preferences, access, family expectations, and individual needs. Equitable care may require adapting practices to support meaningful access and participation.
A student who uses a regional dialect is referred for speech-language evaluation because a teacher says, “The student sounds uneducated.” What should the SLP do first?
The SLP should examine whether the student's communication reflects a language difference or dialect variation rather than a disorder and gather information across contexts and communication partners before determining eligibility or diagnosis.
True or False: All individuals from a specific cultural background will share the same beliefs about healthcare and intervention.
False.
This federal law protects individually identifiable health information held by covered healthcare entities.
HIPAA
True or False: A parent signing a consent form means that the SLP no longer needs to explain what will happen during an evaluation.
What is false?
Consent should be an ongoing process of communication and understanding.
True or False: Cultural responsiveness means memorizing the communication practices of every cultural group a clinician may encounter.
What is false?
Cultural responsiveness requires ongoing learning, self-reflection, humility, and collaboration with clients and families.
A child uses grammatical patterns associated with African American English. The SLP identifies these patterns as errors because they differ from Mainstream American English. What is the primary concern?
The SLP may be confusing language difference with language disorder.
True or False: If a standardized assessment score indicates a possible disorder, the SLP should always diagnose the disorder regardless of other information.
What is false?
Clinical decisions should be based on multiple sources of information. Dynamic Assessments.
A school-based SLP documents a student's evaluation results in the student's educational record. A teacher requests access to the information because the teacher works directly with the student. Which law is most directly relevant to this situation?
What is FERPA?
The teacher may have access if there is a legitimate educational interest and the information is needed to perform professional responsibilities.
A client tells the SLP, “Please do not tell my family about my diagnosis.” The client's family asks the SLP for information. What should the SLP consider before sharing information?
The SLP must consider the client's privacy rights, authorization, legal decision-making authority, and applicable privacy laws.
A parent does not make direct eye contact with the SLP during a meeting. The SLP assumes the parent is uninterested and does not care about the child's therapy. What is the primary concern with this assumption?
The SLP may be interpreting behavior through their own cultural lens and making an unsupported assumption.
A bilingual child performs poorly on an English-only standardized language assessment. Can the SLP conclude that the child has a language disorder based solely on this score?
No.
The SLP must consider the child's language history, exposure, proficiency, cultural and linguistic background, and multiple sources of information.
A teacher says that a student needs speech therapy because the student is “quiet and does not participate.” What should the SLP consider before making a clinical decision?
The SLP should consider:
Whether the concern reflects a communication disorder
Cultural communication norms
Language background
Context
The student's individual preferences and experiences
Multiple sources of assessment information