Helping families find joy at the table
Feeding and swallowing therapy for children
at the table
There's something special about sitting at the kitchen table. It's where families gather, where the day gets talked through, and where traditions are passed down one meal at a time.
ANNA's Table provides individualized, evidence-based feeding and swallowing therapy by telehealth, working with Massachusetts families toward mealtimes that are safer, less stressful and more joyful.
- Individualized feeding and swallowing therapy
- Children up to age 6 — no autism diagnosis needed to be seen
ANNA's Table
Every family has
their own story
Their own worries, and their own version of what a “good meal” looks like. For some families, mealtime doesn't feel like togetherness—it feels like tension. A meal that should bring everyone closer can instead become the hardest part of the day.
We build our care around your family's story. That's why every child receives a comprehensive evaluation before we ever talk about treatment.
Using evidence-based feeding and swallowing treatment, we work to take the stress out of mealtime—not just for your child, but for your whole family.
Our goal is helping your family get back to the table together—with less stress, and a little more joy.
Clinically reviewed September 2026
The full picture matters
Similar signs can have very different causes
Feeding concerns in young children, autistic or not, can come from many different places. What one family calls picky eating and another calls food refusal can turn out to be two very different things. Understanding what is actually happening is the foundation of the right care.
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Sensory or behavioral patterns
A reaction to texture, smell, the unpredictability of a new food, or the experience of the mealtime routine itself.
- Textures, smells, and temperatures
- Unfamiliar or newly introduced foods
- The mealtime routine itself
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Structural or physiological needs
A concern related to how a child's mouth, oral-motor skills, throat, or swallow works—and whether eating is safe and comfortable.
- Oral-motor skills and chewing
- Throat and swallow function
- Whether eating is safe and comfortable
Evaluation first
We start by listening
Our licensed speech-language pathologists evaluate the full picture. They assess oral-motor function and swallowing safety alongside sensory and behavioral patterns, so your child's plan is built on what the evaluation actually finds. This is a clinical feeding and swallowing evaluation, not an imaging study: if your child needs instrumental testing such as a swallow study, we say so and coordinate directly with your child's physician on getting it.
Who we serve
Every child deserves a comprehensive evaluation
ANNA's Table serves children up to age 6. An autism diagnosis is not required to be seen. Feeding and swallowing difficulties show up in all kinds of children, for all kinds of reasons.
Signs to notice
Your child may benefit from a feeding evaluation
These are the things families tell us about, not a checklist that diagnoses anything—only an evaluation with a licensed clinician can tell you what is happening for your child. You don't need to know the cause before reaching out.
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Mealtimes regularly end in tears, tantrums, or a battle—for your child, for you, or both.
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Your child gags, coughs, or chokes frequently during meals.
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Your child's list of accepted foods is short, or foods they used to eat have dropped off it without explanation.
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Mealtimes take much longer than expected, or your child avoids sitting down to eat.
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Your child struggles with certain textures, such as crunchy, mixed, or lumpy foods.
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Your child has never transitioned off purées, or struggled significantly moving from bottle or breast to solid foods.
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Weight gain or growth has slowed, or your pediatrician has raised a concern about nutrition.
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Your child seems anxious, upset, or shuts down at the sight of new or unfamiliar foods.
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Feeding difficulties are getting in the way of family routines, school lunches, playdates, eating out, or travel.
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You simply have a feeling that something is wrong.
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If something is urgent, don't wait for an evaluation. Call your child's pediatrician right away if your child is choking, having trouble breathing while eating, losing weight, or refusing food and drink altogether—and call 911 in an emergency.
This list describes the reasons families get in touch with us. It is not a screening tool and it does not diagnose anything.
Common questions
Questions families
ask first
If yours isn't here, email intake@annaautismcare.com or call (617) 693-5767 and our intake team will get your question to the right person. Please don't use email for anything urgent, or to send medical details—it isn't a secure channel. There are no wrong questions about feeding.
Getting Started
Sometimes it is. Plenty of young children eat from a short list of foods for a while and widen it again on their own, with no help from anyone. What is worth a closer look is when the list keeps shrinking, when meals are distressing for your child or for you, or when gagging, coughing or choking is part of eating.
Whether it gets called picky eating, selective eating or food refusal matters much less than what is causing it—and no one can tell you that from a description, an article or a checklist. That is what an evaluation is for.
Yes—swallowing is half of what this service is. A feeding and swallowing evaluation looks at the whole of eating: how your child accepts food, how they manage it in their mouth, and how safely they swallow it. Difficulty with that last part is what clinicians call dysphagia.
One boundary worth knowing before you book: this is a clinical evaluation, not an imaging one. If your child needs instrumental testing such as a swallow study, we say so and coordinate directly with your child's physician on getting it.
Same profession, different focus. Both are delivered by speech-language pathologists—an SLP's training covers eating and swallowing as well as speech and language, which is why an SLP is who you see about a child who gags, coughs or cannot manage a texture. What ANNA's Table treats is the eating half: how your child accepts food, manages it in the mouth, and swallows it safely.
If your worry is speech or language rather than eating, this is not the program for it. Ask intake what ANNA does and does not offer.
Children from birth to age 6. In practice that means infants who are struggling to move from bottle or breast to solids, toddlers whose list of accepted foods is getting shorter, and preschoolers for whom mealtimes have become the hardest part of the day.
Age 6 is where this program stops. If your child is older, tell intake anyway and they will tell you honestly what ANNA can and cannot offer.
With a conversation. You tell us what mealtimes look like in your house, and we tell you whether an evaluation makes sense. Every child who joins ANNA's Table has a comprehensive evaluation before we talk about a treatment plan.
Evaluations are scheduled on Saturdays. It is deliberate: a weekend appointment means you don't have to pull your child out of school or daycare, and it usually means both caregivers can be there, which matters more than people expect for a feeding evaluation.
No. ANNA's Table serves children up to age 6, with or without a diagnosis. Feeding and swallowing difficulties show up in all kinds of children, for all kinds of reasons. If a diagnosis is what you are looking for, that is a different service at ANNA: autism testing and diagnostic evaluations. Intake can point you to either one.
Your insurance plan is a separate question: many plans ask for a referral or an order from your child's physician before they will cover feeding therapy. That is your plan's requirement rather than ours, and intake will tell you whether yours has one.
A licensed speech-language pathologist takes a full feeding history, then watches your child eat. They assess oral-motor function and swallowing safety alongside sensory and behavioral patterns, because similar signs can have very different causes.
You leave with our clinical impressions and our recommendations, in plain language. An evaluation like this does not include imaging: if we think your child needs a swallow study or another medical test, we refer to your child's physician and coordinate with them directly.
Therapy sessions
At your own table. Therapy is delivered by telemedicine, so your SLP joins the meal you were already going to serve, in the chair your child already sits in, with the plates and cups you already own. Feeding skills have to work in your kitchen in the end, so that is where we would rather practise them.
Our speech-language pathologists are licensed in Massachusetts, so telehealth sessions are available anywhere in the state. If you live outside Massachusetts, tell intake and they will say what is possible.
Anywhere in the state. Feeding therapy here is delivered by telehealth, so there is no catchment area and no drive: a family in MetroWest, in Greater Boston, on the South Shore or out past Worcester joins the same way, from their own kitchen. What bounds this is licensure rather than geography, which is why intake checks your address before you book.
ANNA's seven centers—Andover, Braintree, Foxborough, Sudbury, Wayland, Weston and Woburn—are where the center-based services happen. If your child already goes to one of them, feeding therapy can be added without adding a trip.
At breakfast and dinner mealtimes—the times feeding difficulties actually happen. A session is a real meal with your SLP on the screen, not a practice one scheduled around the clinic's day.
A phone, tablet or laptop with a camera, propped where it can see your child's face and hands, and the meal you'd normally serve. Nothing needs to be bought and nothing needs to be tidied. Your SLP will help you find the camera angle on the first call.
We'll send you a link to join; there is no app to install.
Licensed speech-language pathologists trained in pediatric feeding and swallowing. The same clinician who evaluates your child stays with your family, and caregivers are part of every session—you are the person at the table the other six days of the week.
Coverage and next steps
ANNA's Table is launching in-network with Mass General Brigham plans, and we're working on additional payers. What a plan covers depends on your specific benefits, so the honest answer for any one family is that we need to check.
Our team can verify your benefits and walk you through your options before your first appointment—no guesswork required. If your plan isn't one we're in-network with yet, it is still worth asking: we'll tell you where things stand rather than leaving you to find out later.
It depends entirely on what the evaluation finds, so we won't quote you a number before we've met your child. What we will do is tell you at the evaluation what we expect, and revisit it with you as your child's plan progresses.
Yes, and it's worth doing. When feeding goals and ABA goals are written by teams that talk to each other, mealtimes can stop being the one part of the day nobody owns. The same goes for families in parent coaching. Tell your existing ANNA contact you'd like a feeding evaluation.
Ready when you are
Let's understand what's happening
If any of this sounds familiar, we'd love to talk with you. A comprehensive evaluation is the first step toward helping your family find its way back to the table together. Evaluations are on Saturdays, and therapy is delivered by telehealth anywhere in Massachusetts, from MetroWest and Greater Boston to the South Shore.
- Start with a conversation about your child
- A comprehensive evaluation before any treatment plan
- We coordinate directly with your child's physician
The information on this page is general educational information about pediatric feeding and swallowing, not medical advice, and it is not a substitute for evaluation, diagnosis or treatment by a licensed clinician who knows your child. Reading it does not create a clinician–patient relationship with ANNA or ANNA's Table. If you have questions about your child's feeding, swallowing, growth or nutrition, please talk with your child's pediatrician or a licensed speech-language pathologist. In an emergency, call 911.