What is Aphasia?

Summary

This video features individuals and their families talking about practical tools they've used to help themselves cope with aphasia.

Details

Aphasia is a communication disorder brought on by a stroke or interruption of blood flow to the brain.

Left hemisphere stroke often results in aphasia:

• damage to area of brain that allows us to assign meaning to words
• difficult to speak, understand, read or write

Aphasia does not mean a loss of:

• intelligence
• hearing
• awareness
• personality

Patient needs to see familiar faces, hear voices, be involved in decisions about care.

Trauma to the brain may cause swelling, until this swelling subsides it is difficult to assess how much damage has been done and how much facility will return.

Most survivors will have some permanent loss but communication will improve over time.

As recovery progresses other areas of the brain seem to pick up lost functions.

Receptive aphasia:

• problems with listening and reading

Expressive aphasia:

• problems with speaking and writing

Receptive aphasia:

• may cause changes in attention
• easily distracted
• don't always respond to spoken words
• retention of heard info is diminished
• numbers and instructions are particularly hard to remember
• difficult to understand and integrate things like jokes and innuendo

To improve communication:

• eliminate distractions
• get attention through touch and saying name
• best when patient is rested
• note taking may help memory
• ask people to repeat if you don't understand - repetition is very helpful

Inability to attach meaning to words (agnosia):

• changing normal inflection conflicts with message - speak normally

Effective communication:

• get attention first
• use normal tone of voice
• be brief and specific
• reinforce message
• use gestures and pause often to let message sink in
• confirm message was understood

Reading:

• problems may come from changes in visual perception
• inability to distinguish things
• often need to keep backtracking over what was read due to decreased retention

Reading tips:

• slow down
• read out loud
• pause frequently
• use a guide or finger to keep track
• discuss material with someone else
• try talking books as an alternative

Expressive aphasia:

• dysarthria (imprecise or slurred speech)
• dyspraxia or apraxia (errors in speech production - can't form and say out loud although you can hear in head)
• cue with first sound may help find word
• can learn to make selves understood through gestures, facial expressions and drawings
• letting people know takes the pressure off and makes more fluent
• dysnomia (difficulty naming objects)
• learn the art of talking around a missing word until finding one that works
• memorize difficult names, words and numbers
• words may be there, but grammar is missing
• speech may be simplified (like a telegram)
• speech may be disorganized and drift off topic

Telephone tips:

• write down what want to say
• use speaker phone to leave hands free

Writing:

• language, motor skills and spelling are all often impaired
• typewriter or word processor may make it easier than writing longhand