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Speech Therapy for a Stroke Patient

The good fortune of stroke survival is often tempered by some negative side effects, including muscle weakness and communication problems. One of the most common forms of stroke-related communication impairments is aphasia, relating to a person's ability to produce or process language. Fortunately, speech language pathologists are equipped to help aphasic patients strengthen their communicative muscles and words.

  1. Aphasia

    • Note that aphasia is impairment in speaking and language skills rather than damage to thinking skills. In other words, a person with aphasia is just as intelligent as he or she was before the stroke, but now has trouble communicating thoughts using language. Losing the simple ability to express thoughts can be very frustrating for someone with aphasia.

    Muscle Exercises

    • Part of aphasia involves weakness on the affected side of the body (opposite of the side of the brain that had the stroke). As a result, the stroke patient should be exercising the muscles on that side, including those involved with speaking. A speech language pathologist may have a patient exercise by asking him to speak certain words repetitively, make certain facial expressions, and chew on food.

    Workbooks

    • Workbook activities help improve the reading and writing skills of an aphasic patient. Activities might include matching games, rhyming exercises, phrase completion, spelling, word-finding, and crossword-like puzzles. These activities may also improve an aphasic patient's ability to recall words.

    Pictures

    • Therapists often show cards with pictures of everyday life to aphasic patients. By showing the cards to the patient and asking the patient to say what is on the card, the patient can exercise weak articulation muscles, practice vocalizing words, and recall certain words while associating them with pictures. Therapists also use picture boards to help an aphasic patient communicate. For example, they might place on the board some pictures of common activities and objects so that the patient can point to them to get messages across to others.

    Software

    • New computer programs have been developed with the sole purpose of helping people afflicted with aphasia. They use interactive activities much like a speech language pathologist would use, including picture and sentence games. However, patients should consult a speech therapist before choosing a program because different programs address different communication difficulties.

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