Hegarty Therapy work with children and young people who have speech, language, communication, feeding, and swallowing (dysphagia) needs.  In partnership with families, schools, and early years services across Eastbourne, Brighton and Hove, East Sussex and West Sussex. We build flexible and affordable packages, delivering high quality assessment, therapy and support tailored to each child’s individual needs.

Autism Diagnostic Assessment

We provide comprehensive autism diagnostic assessments in Brighton, Eastbourne, and across Sussex. Our multi-disciplinary team of highly skilled professionals includes Speech and Language Therapists, Occupational Therapists, and a Clinical Psychologist, all with specialist training in diagnosing Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), also known as Autism Spectrum Condition (ASC)

Other services

We have a wide range of experience in speech and language therapy working with children and young people in the following areas:

  • Autism Spectrum Disorder (also known as Autism Spectrum Condition)

  • Stammering (Dysfluency)

  • Selective Mutism

  • Speech Delay, Articulation and Phonological Awareness difficulties

  • Speech Sound Disorder (Phonological Disorder/Developmental Verbal Dyspraxia)

  • Language Delay

  • Developmental Language Disorder

  • Feeding and Swallowing Difficulties

We are registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and are members of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT). We have enhanced DBS clearance.

Hegarty Therapy is registered with all health insurers, please inform the therapist before the start of therapy if you have health insurance.

Testimonials

  • Parent of Pre-School Child with Social Communication Difficulties

    First of all, Anne is fantastic and we are so happy to have her supporting our son! From the very first session, he has been able to engage with Anne in a way we haven’t seen him engage with anyone else. Her gentle, child-led approach meant that he very quickly felt comfortable with her and he always seems really happy to see her.

    Our son really struggles with any form of demand and this makes him shut off from others, Anne has been brilliant at finding ways of encouraging him to communicate and engage in the sessions without him feeling like demands are being placed on him.

    His confidence in communicating, and especially with his speech, has soared since his sessions with Anne started a couple of months ago. It was been wonderful to see his confidence building and his frustration gradually reducing.

    He enjoys his sessions with Anne so much that initially, he would be very upset that she was leaving at the end! Thankfully, he now understands she is coming back, so the end of the session is easier for him.

    Anne is always very open to discussing what we want for our son, any ideas or concerns we have at home, and answering any questions we have. She has also been really helpful in offering advice to support some challenges he has had at nursery due to communication/understanding.

    Both my husband and I are incredibly happy to have Anne as part of our son’s little team!

  • Parent of a Young Child who Stammers

    Sandra is an incredible Speech Therapist and we feel very lucky that we found her to help our 7 year old daughter with her stammer. Our daughter’s stammer was not extreme, but it was enough to start affecting her self-confidence. Sandra guided us through the Lidcombe programme, making sure that we use a variety of exercises in our daily sessions to keep our daughter engaged. She explained to our daughter that daily exercises would mean more of special mummy and daddy time with her alone and we all enjoyed those sessions. Our daughter was at ease with Sandra and connected with her, even more, when she learned that Sandra stammered when she was young.

    Sandra’s encouragement and guidance has been invaluable. We worked daily with our daughter for a few months, and the progress has been remarkable. Six months after the first meeting with Sandra, our daughter’s stammer was barely noticeable. We are now exactly one year since our first session and I am happy to report that our daughter is now entirely stammer-free. She finished the programme with a huge sense of achievement and her confidence has grown along the way. Her life has changed for the better, and for that we will be always grateful to Sandra.

  • Parent of a Young Child with a Stammer

    Sandra has a most wonderful way of working with children. Her energy is light, fun and so encouraging. My son actively looked forward to his sessions with Sandra. She taught him not only some great techniques to utilise for his stammer (which really helped) but also encouraged his confidence to speak, and to be proud of himself. I cannot recommend Sandra enough to other families. She is a brilliant specialist at what she does and I am so grateful to her for the work she did with our son, and the service she offers to children. Thank you!

  • Parent of a Young Person With a Stammer

    Sandra worked with my son to control his stammer. Sandra has a wonderful friendly manor and made him feel very relaxed during their sessions. She spoke to him about his concerns and established exactly what they were and then provided very easy to understand methods of coping and controlling his stammer. This gave him a lot of confidence and a real sense of control. Sandra also gave us a clear breakdown at the end of the sessions, of what had covered and my son's progress. By the end of the program he felt much more confident in himself and in his ability to communicate with his peers and in the classroom. We would highly recommend Sandra.

  • Parent of Child With Word Finding Difficulties

    Jayne has been my 6 year old son’s speech therapist for the last 6 months and I cannot praise her highly enough.

    She is really friendly and approachable and immediately put myself and my son at ease. She has since established a lovely working relationship with him, to the extent that he looks forward to his sessions with her! She has great clinical expertise and I have noticed a real improvement in my son’s speech and confidence with using language since he has been seeing her.

    Jayne has also been really willing to liaise with school and has done this in a co-operative but authoritative way, providing recommendations that the school has been able to take on board and attending meetings with me.  The support that Jayne has given me has been invaluable in helping me to navigate the complex Education and Health systems and given me confidence to advocate for my son in school.

  • Parent of Child with Delayed Speech

    Jayne is warm, enthusiastic and has the patience of a saint! She has been seeing our son for a few weeks now for a delayed speech problem that occurred from having glue ear, and he adores her. He has come on leaps and bounds since seeing her and Jayne always makes the lessons fun whilst ensuring the job still gets done. I wouldn't hesitate in recommending her.

  • Parent of Child with Language Disorder

    Jayne has been working with my son who’s 3 for the past few months. He was very delayed in his speech and was diagnosed with a language disorder. As a parent and knowing nothing about speech therapy it was a scary diagnosis but Jayne has been brilliant. My Son adores her visits and waits very excitedly for ‘the lady with the toys’ every week. Jayne plays games with him which he loves and he is constantly absorbing new words and sentence structure. He has come on leaps and bounds in the last few months and whilst there is still some hard work to be done we are looking forward to Austin starting school as normal in September level with his peers. I cannot thank Jayne enough for all her hard work and dedication!

  • Parent of Child With Selective Mutism

    Jayne's consulting role has been really useful in relation to Selective Mutism and my daughter. Jayne has helped us create a real pathway towards talking. Besides her invaluable advice about sliding-in techniques, Jayne was also able to bring together a team of various professionals working on this issue i.e. the school's staff, SENCO, key workers, CAHMS and ourselves, parents. After a few months of team work, my daughter recently started speaking to one person at school after two years of silence. She is making progress and we are so grateful. Thank you so much Jayne!

  • Parent of Young Child Needing Speech and Language Therapy

    We approached Hegarty Therapy in March 2022 and they were so efficient with getting back to us regarding our little boy needing speech therapy. We were appointed Hannah and we were honestly blown away with all of her knowledge and understanding. She opened our eyes into a world where there are so many different ways you can communicate without having a voice.

    Hannah would visit us frequently with a warm smiley welcome. She was always more than happy to visit our little boys nursery to spend time with members of staff, showing them what we were working on at home - so we were all working together.

    Our little boy is now thriving using his picture cards, making eye contact and leading play activities we can enjoy playing together as a family. That is all down to Hannah and we honestly cannot thank her enough!

    Going on this journey is very hard and emotional, but having the right support from companies like Hegarty Therapy and members of staff like Hannah, it really has made the difference and helped our family hugely.

    Of course we hope our little boy will speak one day, but as we have understood through Hannah communication comes in many different ways and taking the time and patience to introduce these techniques will hopefully help your little ones thrive and communicate, like our little boy is.

    Thank you, thank you, thank you