ADVANTAGE SLP

Steveston's Award-Winning SLPs

Shari Linde is living her dream as the founder, owner, and director of Advantage Speech- Language Pathology. While she was in high school, Shari was curious about what career would be her best match; she took an aptitude test and discovered speech-language pathology was number one on the list. She headed off to the University of Western Ontario where she received her M.Sc., and the rest is history.

She has been working as a speech-language

pathologist since 1994. Shari specializes in the communication difficulties of adults and children who have neurological damage, developmental delays or disorders, psychiatric conditions, or autism. She also has extensive experience addressing swallowing impairments. Shari is on the Registry of Autism Service Providers in B.C., with designations as a speechlanguage pathologist and behaviour consultant.

Shari’s expertise in the field has also been recognized by her peers – she is currently the Chair of Speech-Language & Audiology Canada. In addition, she is a clinical assistant professor at UBC.

Advantage SLP was awarded Small Business of the Year by the Richmond Chamber of Commerce in 2019.

After working out of her home for many years, Shari opened Advantage SLP’s office space on Chatham Street in 2017. She says, “It has really evolved. I blinked, and it became full time. Before long I had brought on more and more people. The business has grown to a staff of four full-time and 18 part-time SLPs, four assistants, four administrators, and 12 volunteers.”

Advantage Speech-Language Pathology provides diagnostic and therapeutic services for children, adolescents, and adults. The team of speech-language pathologists sees clients of all ages with all types of communication and feeding/swallowing concerns. The multilingual team provides services in 13 languages. Shari comments, “We have the best therapists and staff.”

Services are provided in the office in Steveston as well as off-site in home, school, and community settings around the Lower Mainland and the Fraser Valley. Teletherapy services are also available.

Shari Linde, Founder, Owner & Director of Advantage SLP

photo by Sandra Steier

Advantage SLP works with children and youth who have many different communication difficulties. The SLP team develops individualized programs to meet a child’s specific needs.

Areas of service include articulation and speech sound production, augmentative communication, autism spectrum disorders, hearing-related communication problems, language delay, learning disabilities, (including challenges with reading and writing), neurologically-based communication disorders (such as challenges resulting from acquired brain injury or cerebral palsy), social/pragmatic language, stuttering, tongue thrust, feeding and swallowing challenges, and voice disorders.

In addition, Advantage SLP provides assessment and treatment services to adults with a wide variety of challenges. These include acquired brain injuries, such as those caused by strokes or traumatic injuries, progressive neurological conditions (such as Parkinson’s Disease), difficulties with voice production as experienced by high occupational voice users such as singers or teachers, stuttering, foreign accent modification, speech sound difficulties (including persistent lisps), problems with swallowing, and communication challenges which interfere with academic or vocational success (for example, reading and writing difficulties).

Individualized programs for adults are set up to meet the needs of each client. Treatment is typically done on a one-to-one basis. Where appropriate, group treatment options may also be available, such as for stuttering treatment or foreign accent modification.

Clients range in age from infants to people in their 80s.

​At the onset of the pandemic, Shari had to pivot her business. Like most businesses, the office closed during the lockdown in March 2020, and when it reopened the method of operating became, and continues to be, a hybrid between in-person and off-site appointments and teletherapy by Zoom.

Zoom has opened opportunities that previously did not exist. For example, Shari now has two Alberta based therapists working for her. Teletherapy has changed how some clients are seen. Older kids and adults have been receptive to the flexibility of being able to Zoom from home. Younger clients and their families benefit from coaching and education in their home environment.

Shari mentions, “Teletherapy will certainly carry on after the pandemic. It has expanded our world; clients now come from all over B.C. Absenteeism has gone down significantly and many clients often do better on Zoom. We can run groups on Zoom; some meet from as far away as Fort St. John.” Teletherapy is also advantageous for people who are homebound after experiencing a stroke.

Some clients opt for home visits including those who have had a brain injury or swallowing issues. Some children do better at home with an SLP. Other clients have trouble arranging in-person visits or face challenges with transportation.

In-person visits are extremely rewarding for children. Shari says, “They often refer to their time with their SLP as ‘talk play’ and that is a very good description!”

Shari says, “It is so rewarding when you see kids who are struggling to communicate, and we can help them to get their messages across, or parents tell us something we’ve been practicing with their child is working at home. These are signs of validation that what we are doing is making a difference.” She adds, “We do change lives.”

Shari concludes, “I am blessed to be in a job I love. I love making a difference – and I get to play every day!”

Advantage Speech-Language Pathology

3740 Chatham St #205 Richmond, BC V7E 2Z3 Telephone 604-370-2757

www.advantageslp.com