Meet the founder
Hello, I’m Holly Murphy, the founder of ‘Communicate to Connect’. I am a Senior Speech and Language Therapist with experience in various cultural settings from London to New Zealand and most recently Ireland…
I started my career in London, working in acute hospitals, rehabilitation and community settings. I provided assessment and intervention to younger and older adults with speech and language difficulties and dysphagia post stroke, brain injury and with progressive neurological disorders.
In 2016 I joined the Stroke Association in London as a Communication Support Coordinator. People were referred from acute and rehabilitation hospitals. I supported people with aphasia, breaking down their communication barriers and reclaiming the normality in their lives. Here I led a project setting up an ‘Aphasia-Friendly’ cafe in a Costa coffee cafe. We educated the staff on aphasia and provided simple ways for them to support those affected during the simple task of ordering a cup of coffee. It was equally rewarding and challenging achieving our goal to increase independence and confidence while overcoming the communication barriers of aphasia.
In 2017 I moved to New Zealand and joined the speech and language therapy force at the Ministry of Education. I focused on the up-skilling and education of the adults and teachers who interacted with children daily at home or in school. I got the opportunity to provide assessment and intervention to children aged 2-21yrs with language disorders, delays, autism, Down syndrome and fetal alcohol syndrome. I collaborated with an occupational therapist and our technology support service to trial software, devices and switches that gave non-verbal children a voice and means to communicate, for example, a child with a severe motor speech disorder associated with cerebral palsy.
In 2019 I created a school based project called ‘Lego-Language Club’. I worked closely with a principal and her teachers to implement this adapted version of lego therapy. Together we saw first-hand the improvements in children’s use of language, problem solving abilities and social skills. Their confidence and courage to express themselves to their peers also developed. These children had a diagnosis of autism and/or a Developmental Language disorder and for them to begin to express positive and negative feelings openly was hugely rewarding. I will be setting up a similar Lego-Language club in communicate to connect.
I continue to develop my skills and practice in order to provide the most effective and up to date service for my clients.