Newcastle University

Background

I qualified as a speech and language therapist here in Newcastle in 1981 and completed my teacher training in 1982. I worked as a teacher-therapist in a special school and a mainstream language unit for five years, before travelling overseas. I worked as an English teacher in Kathmandu, Nepal for a few months and as a speech pathologist in Melbourne, Australia. In 1991 I was appointed Manager of the NHS Paediatric Speech and Language Therapy Service in Newcastle and for three years was also Professional Adviser for all Newcastle speech and language therapy services. More recently I have worked as a specialist speech and language therapist in child and adolescent mental health, completing my PhD in 2004. I assess overseas applicants to the Speech and Language Therapy Register for the Health Professions Council and have sat on Investigating and Disciplinary Panels for them. In February 2005 I started working at Newcastle University as a part time clinical educator, while continuing to work in the NHS. I now work three days a week as a lecturer and speech and language therapist in the Speech and Language Sciences Section. My particular interest both in teaching and research is the promotion of the use and creation of research evidence to support clinical practice in speech and language therapy.

Roles and Responsibilities

Degree Programme Director for the MSc in Evidence Based Practice in Communication Disorders
Course co-ordinator RCSLT Return to Practice Distance Learning Course
Director of Newcastle University Children's Speech and Language Therapy Clinic
Treasurer of the RCSLT Northern Research SIG
Member of the RCSLT Professional Development and Standards Board Member of the North of Tyne SLT Research Collaboration
External examiner for UCL MSc in Speech and Language Sciences
Director of Clinical Education (2006-2008)

Qualifications

2004 PhD Thesis Title: Children and Adolescents with Emotional and Behavioural Disorders and Speech and Language Impairment: Incidence, Nature and Intervention
1982 Post Graduate Certificate in Education (Primary Years)
1981 BSc (Hons) Speech

Previous Positions

Specialist Speech and Language Therapist (CAMH Practitioner-Researcher)
Newcastle Hospitals NHS Trust (09/1999 to 08/2007)
Health Professions Council Partner (from 04/2002 to present) Registrant Assessor, Panel member for Health; Conduct and Competency and Investigation Committees.
Professional Adviser for Speech and Language Therapy to Newcastle City Health (NHS) Trust (08/1997 to 03/2001)
Manager Paediatric Speech and Language Therapy Service Newcastle City Health (NHS) Trust (07/1991 to 03/2000)

Memberships

Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists
Health Professions Council
Association for Child and Adolescent Mental Health

Research Interests

My research interests are closely associated with my clinical work: children and adolescents with behaviour difficulties and young children with speech difficulties. I am particularly interested in the assessment process and the effectiveness of speech and language therapy interventions.

Other Expertise

I am working with colleagues within the SLS section and NHS North of Tyne Primary Care Organisations on projects to develop and maintain a research ready and research active workforce in speech and language therapy. In 2010 I wrote a series of tutorials on Evidence Based Practice Tools for Speech and Language Therapists, published in the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists' monthly Bulletin.

Current Work

I am currently involved in the following projects:
Evaluation of the effectiveness of different established and novel interventions for children with developmental speech disorders. Project in collaboration with Ms Di Nicholson, Northumberland Care Trust.
A Knowledge Transfer Partnership with Northumberland Church of England Academy to develop a model of partnership working with local NHS Speech and Language Therapy services providing a language rich environment for Nursery Children in NCEA. This project started in January 2011 and will run for two years. Kate Jones is the KTP Associate.
Evaluating the impact of phonological awareness intervention on children with literacy/language/behaviour difficulties. A project with Professor James Law and Ms Alex Wiles, Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

Research Roles

As a member of the North of Tyne SLT Research Collaboration I support and work in partnership with speech and language therapists in the North East of Engand to use evidence in their practice; to apply research methods to evaluate their practice and contribute to the evidence base of our profession.

Postgraduate Supervision

I am currently supervising Yalda Kazemi Najafabadi

Funding

2001 Grant from the NHS Northern and Yorkshire Region to study ‘The Incidence and Nature of Communication Disorder in Adolescents with Sexually Abusive Behaviour’
2006 Research Bursary from NoReN (Northern Primary Care Research Network) for protected time for writing for publication.
2009 Funding from the CLRN
2011 Funding from the Technology Strategy Board and ESRC for the KTP project with Northumberland Church of England Academy

Undergraduate Teaching

Evidence Based Practice
Professional Issues
Developmental Speech disorders 1 & 2
Clinical Practice

Postgraduate Teaching

Evidence Based Practice
Professional Issues
Developmental Speech Disorders 1 & 2
Clinical Practice
Critical Appraisal
Scientific writing for publication
Advanced assessment of children with speech language and ommunication needs (SLCN)

• Stringer H. The Practicalities (of conducting practice-based research). In: Dobinson, C Wren, Y, ed. Creating Practice-based Evidence: A Guide for Speech and Language Therapists. London: J&R Press, 2013. In Preparation.
• Stringer H. Restructuring SIGs to support CPD. RCSLT Bulletin 2011, 675, 24.
• Stringer H. Changing Practice. RCSLT Bulletin 2010, 673, 28.
• Stringer H. Evaluating the Written Evidence. RCSLT Bulletin 2010, 672, 22.
• Stringer H. Evidence Based Practice in Action. RCSLT Bulletin 2010, 674, 21-22.
• Stringer H. Formulating Evidence Based Practice Questions. RCSLT Bulletin 2010, 670, 22.
• Stringer H. From the Research Strategy to Practice. RCSLT Bulletin 2010, 698, 22.
• Stringer H. Searching for Evidence. RCSLT Bulletin 2010, 671, 22.
• Stringer H. What is Evidence Based Practice? RCSLT Bulletin. RCSLT Bulletin 2010, 699, 22.
• Law J, Plunkett C, Stringer H. Communication interventions and their impact on behaviour in the young child: A systematic review. Child Language Teaching and Therapy 2012, 28(1), 7-23.
• McKean C, Stringer H, Klee T. A missed opportunity. Bulletin of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists 2010, 695(5).
• Stringer H, Jenkin J. Chapter 4: Speech and Language Therapy. In: Bernard, SH; Turk, J, ed. Developing Mental Health Services for Children and Adolescents with Learning Disabilities: A Toolkit for Clinicians. London: The Royal College of Psychiatrists, 2009, pp. 28-32.
• Klee T, Stringer H, Howard D. Teaching evidence-based practice to speech and language therapy students in the United Kingdom. Evidence-Based Communication Assessment and Intervention 2009, 3(4), 195-207.
• Stringer H, Lozano S. Under identification of speech and language impairment in children attending a special school for children with emotional and behavioural disorders. Educational and Child Psychology 2007, 24(4), 9-19.
• Stringer H. Intervention to facilitate narrative and social skills in secondary school students with language and behaviour difficulties. In:Clegg, J., Ginsborg, J., ed. Language and Social Disadvantage.London:Wiley,2006, pp. 199-206.
• Stringer H, Clegg J. Language, Behaviour and Social Disadvantage. In:Clegg, J., Ginsborg, J., ed. Language and Social Disadvantage.London:Wiley,2006, pp. 93-105.
• Stringer, H. Children and Adolescents with Emotional and Behavioural Disorders and Speech and Language Impairment: Incidence, Nature and Intervention Doctoral Thesis. Ph.D. thesis, Newcastle, 2004.
• Stringer H, Lozano S, Dodd B. The link between language disorders and behavioural difficulties in adolescents. Afasic News 2004,Winter 12-13.
• Stringer H. The incidence and nature of communication disorder in sexually abusive adolescents (RRCC177R). London, UK: NHS Research Findings Register, 2003.
• Stringer H. The incidence and nature of communication disorders in adolescents with sexually abusive behaviour. In: Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists Sharing Communication. 2001, Birmingham, UK.
• Stringer, H. Towards a Core Caseload: Implementing a Discharge Policy. Human Communication 1992, 2(2).
• Stringer, H. Setting up an Infant Language Unit: A Pilot Study. Child Language Teaching and Therapy 1985, 1(2).
• Stringer H. Comparison of methods of eliciting best language sample: narrative, formulated sentences. 2012. In Preparation.