What Do We Know About Speech-Language-Hearing Practice in Vocal Care for Transgender People? A Scoping Review.

Objective: To systematically assess the current state of speech-language-hearing (SLH) practices in health services addressing vocal care for transgender individuals, aiming to identify key themes and gaps in the existing body of knowledge.

Methods: This scoping review was based on the Joanna Briggs Institute manual and followed the recommendations of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses-Extension for Scoping Reviews. It was registered with the Open Science Framework Open Source 10.17605/OSF.IO/BUCRG.

Results: Altogether, 1517 studies were found. After excluding duplicates and applying the eligibility criteria, 103 articles were chosen for the review. The studies addressed topics such as vocal training, case/experience reports, barriers to access services, SLH pathologists' and students' perception and knowledge about the transgender voice, evaluation of programs and services, transgender people's perception and knowledge about their own voice and SLH care, acoustic/auditory-perceptual evaluation, protocols, instruments, impacts of voice on quality of life, verbal and nonverbal communication, and hormone therapy and surgeries.

Conclusions: The summary of the studies reflects the diversity of methods applied in research on transgender people's communication and voice, as well as the variety of topics. Despite the increasing publications on vocal care for transgender people, it is necessary to ensure the dissemination of evidence to support effective practices that recognize and enhance the diversity of this population. Literature data have promising SLH procedures and useful protocols to assess this population. However, they do not clearly indicate what the transgender population actually wants and needs. Furthermore, the study types have not progressed in a coherent order-that is, from preliminary studies to those with more robust methods. Thus, such knowledge may lack consolidation. Many answers to questions in both clinical and academic practices are still not entirely clear. However, it is believed that the advancement of studies will clarify them.