Brief History of SLP development

In China, a professional who works with patients with communication disorders is called a speech therapist. Speech therapy is still an emerging discipline in China. Professor Yang Hejun and Professor Liu Yongxiang from Beijing Friendship Hospital, pioneers in voice disorder research, established the Voice Medical Clinic and the Artistic Voice Research Laboratories in 1979. The China Rehabilitation Research Center for Hearing and Speech Impairment (formerly the China Deaf Children Rehabilitation Research Center) was established in 1983 and is affiliated with the China Disabled Persons’ Federation. It is China’s sole state-level institution dedicated to hearing and speech rehabilitation, which has been pivotal in developing and refining rehabilitation methods, techniques, and industry standards for children with hearing impairments in China. In 1988, the China Rehabilitation Research Center, also known as Beijing Boai Hospital (a public hospital in Beijing), established its Hearing and Speech Department (Li, 2011). Professor Li Shengli, the inaugural director of the China Rehabilitation Research Center, pursued advanced studies in the late 1980s and early 1990s at the University of British Columbia in Canada and the National Rehabilitation Center of Japan. Meanwhile, Professor Tian Hong became the first to study speech-language pathology at the National Rehabilitation Center of Japan. This initiative to foster the speech therapy profession  in China received financial support from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). JICA dispatched more than a dozen Japanese experts in speech-language pathology to provide continuous guidance to the China Rehabilitation Research Center over five years in the 1980s. This collaboration introduced multiple Japanese speech-language pathology assessment tools to China.

Education

Since the 1980s, training pathways have evolved from early-stage short-term training (ranging from 1­2 weeks, 3­6 weeks, or up to 1 year) utilized from 1983­ to 1988. From 1989 to 2000, rehabilitation treatment majors (which did not specify speech-language pathology), emerged on the educational landscape. Technical secondary schools, colleges, and universities offered these rehabilitation treatment programs. After 2001, there was a significant shift towards full-time higher education in rehabilitation therapy and dedicated programs in speech and language therapy (Zhuo, 2004) were created. Speech therapy education in China initially began in vocational and technical schools and medical colleges. Presently, SLP programs in China fall under four types: Hearing and Speech Rehabilitation, Speech and Hearing Rehabilitation Technique, Speech and Hearing Sciences, and Educational Rehabilitation.

Zhejiang Chinese Medical University started to offer an undergraduate degree in audiology in 2001, making it the earliest program of its type in China. In 2004, East China Normal University successfully established the first undergraduate major in Speech and Hearing Sciences. Ningbo College of Health Sciences took the lead in introducing the Speech and Hearing Rehabilitation Technique major in 2012. The School of Language Rehabilitation at Beijing Language and Culture University was founded in 2018. It was the first institution in China to offer an SLP major at a linguistics-focused university. short, 43 universities are currently offering programs training Speech-Language Therapists (SLTs) and audiologists in China. These programs have received recognition from the Ministry of Education of China. These universities include 17 vocational colleges, 26 undergraduate institutions, and eight programs offering master’s and/or doctoral degrees. In China, vocational colleges typically offer three-year programs emphasizing skills and practical applications, while universities provide four-year undergraduate programs focusing on comprehensive education and research capabilities.

Unlike the UK and the U.S., no authoritative body currently regulates the curriculum, content, and the quality of SLP programs in China. Most higher education institutes include content related to both speech-language pathology and audiology. After graduation, students can choose between becoming speech therapists or audiologists. Individual departments may tailor their courses to align with the unique characteristics of their institutions.