VerifiedSpeech-language therapy is about communication and swallowing. The caseload runs from children who are late to talk, through stroke patients relearning speech, to people who cannot swallow safely after surgery or illness. The swallowing work is clinical and urgent and is a large part of the hospital job.
It shares a professional board with audiology and is usually taught in the same department, but the daily work is different and so is where you end up employed: schools and community clinics as much as hospitals.
Registration and community service
You register with the HPCSA Professional Board for Speech, Language and Hearing Professions. The Department of Health’s community service list names speech therapists and speech and audiology therapists separately, and both owe one remunerated year at an approved establishment before independent practice.
Placements run on two allocation cycles a year, annual and mid-year, through the department’s online system. Confirmed 23 September 2026.
The school-based route
A large share of speech therapy posts sit in education rather than health: school-based support teams, special schools and early childhood development. That widens the funding, because education funders count as well as health ones. The SACEE Norah Taylor bursary comes from the South African Council for English Education and is relevant if language development is your interest.
Bursaries for speech therapy
- SASLHA, the South African Speech-Language-Hearing Association
- SACEE Norah Taylor bursary
- Gauteng Department of Health
- KwaZulu-Natal Department of Health
- Western Cape Department of Health and Wellness
- Mpumalanga Provincial Government
- North West Provincial Government
- Mediclinic and ER24
- ISFAP
- Exxaro
See also our education bursaries page for the school-based route and psychology bursaries, which overlaps the developmental work.
