Maria da Assuncao Coelho de Matos

Speech and Language Therapist (SLT) since 1990. Worked in a Central Hospital, at the Rehabilitation Department, for 26 years, with adults with acquired communication and swallowing disorders. Has a PhD, finished in 2012, at the University of Aveiro, Portugal. Specialist in Speech and Language Therapy by the University of Aveiro. Post-Graduated in Swallowing Disorders by the ESSD, Barcelona, Spain. Simultaneously (1996-2005) has been lecturing, in the SLT course, at ESTSP, in Porto, Portugal and since 2005 (full time since September 2016) at the Health School of the University of Aveiro, in Aveiro, Portugal. She is (since October 2020) the Director of the SLT course and the Director of the Post-Graduation in Communication and Swallowing Acquired Disorders in Adults and in the Elderly. She was the Coordinator of the Dysphagia Department of the Portuguese Society of SLT (2014-2018). She is the President of IPA (Portuguese Institute of Aphasia). Dysphagia and Aphasia assessment/intervention considering its consequences in people lives as well as their family members and friends are its main interests in terms of investigation. She is also interested in the use of AAC by adults with acquired communication disorders and in family members training/involvement in therapy as facilitators of this process.