Abstract

Integrating counseling education and training in speech-language pathology (SLP) and audiology programs is crucial to ensure comprehensive and effective patient care by students. In counseling education, students learn to guide patients and their families through the emotional and psychological impacts of communication disorders, ensuring holistic support. Located in a South African context, this pilot study explored how SLP and audiology students understood and experienced counseling with patients living with communication disorders and their families. A self-developed questionnaire was utilized to collect data from students registered in SLP and audiology programs, respectively. Using thematic analysis, the findings indicated that students understood counseling as the provision of educational information and adjustment support and that they faced several challenges when providing counseling (i.e., difficulties in applying counseling knowledge in practice and content recall, lack of confidence, and lack of practice). This study highlights considerations to be made for improving the counseling module taught in the university’s SLP and audiology programs.