Aphasia Communication Guide: Strategies for Clients and Their Families

This assignment delves into the communication challenges associated with aphasia, a language disorder resulting from brain damage. It identifies potential barriers in communicating with aphasic clients, such as expressive and receptive aphasia, and proposes practical strategies to enhance communication. These strategies include minimizing distractions, using clear and simple language, employing visual aids, and encouraging alternative communication methods like drawing and gestures. The assignment also highlights valuable online resources like SCATM (Supported Conversation for Adults With Aphasia) and BCA (Better Conversations with Aphasia) that offer support and training for both individuals with aphasia, their families, and healthcare professionals. The ultimate goal is to foster effective communication that promotes understanding, reduces frustration, and improves the overall quality of life for people with aphasia. Desklib offers a variety of resources for students, including solved assignments and past papers.

Running head: APHASIA
Aphasia
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author note:

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Aphasia is a language disorder, which happens in case of damage in a specific region
of the brain. A brain has two halves; damage on the left side of the brain results in language
problems. It is often caused because of stokes. However, the other possible causes include
brain tumor, head trauma, neurodegenerative diseases and infections. Aphasia may lead to
several different problems ranging from trouble while talking, writing, reading or
understanding spoken language (Goodglass, 2013). This paper will elaborate on the expected
barriers to communicate with the Aphasic clients and the way to effectively communicate
with them.
Expected communication barriers- The symptoms of Aphasia may vary according to
the location of brain damage (de Aguiar, Paolazzi & Miceli, 2015). With the same, the signs
or symptoms may or may not be there in an individual suffering from this disorder and may
differ in the severity as well as level of the inference to communication. Some people have
problem in writing or saying words correctly. This type of Aphasia is termed as expressive
aphasia. In this case, people have the ability to understand what are being said them. If they
do not understand the words in written way, then they are known to be suffering from
receptive aphasia. Expressive aphasia is both fluent and non-fluent in nature, which means; in
this case a person has trouble in speaking, finding out the right words, saying more than one
word at a time. While in fluent aphasia, people are able to put many words together but the
thing they say does not make any sense. Often they are not aware of the same as well.
Strategies to improve communication with people suffering from Aphasia
Communicating with people suffering with Aphasia might not be a simple task. They
become frustrated when they realize that the others are not able to understand them or when
they cannot understand others. It also makes them feel defeated and disappointed when they
cannot find the right words (Carlsson, Hartelius & Saldert, 2014). Language and speech

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therapists could work with the people who are suffering from this disorder and for their
families to enhance their ability to communicate. However, before starting with anything, one
must make it clear in his mind that there is difference between not knowing the answer and
not being able to answer. Speaking inability is never a reflection of intellect.
There are several ways to improve the daily communication with people suffering
from Aphasia. Some of them are mentioned below:
 Keeping the noise and distractions down by turning off the TV and radio
 Moving to a less noisy or quieter room
 Talking with them in adult language.
 Never pretend that they are understood, if they are not.
 Never make them feel as if they are kids or children
 Do not shout at them when they cannot understand your language
 Always try to make an eye contact while talking to them
 While asking them questions, try to ask them Yes-No questions, so that they
can answer easily
 Visual signal are also helpful if you can give them
 While giving them instructions, break those instructions into small and easy
steps.
 In case if they tend to become frustrated, try to change the activity
 Encourage them to use other ways for communicating such as drawings, hand
gestures and pointing.
 Providing a book of words and pictures regarding common people or topics to
them as well as their family members would make the communication a lot
easier.

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 Always try to keep them involved in continuous conversation and ensure that
they understand your sayings, but try not to force them too hard to make them
understand, as this may result in frustration.
 Avoid correcting them if they remember something mistakenly.
 Always try to take them out for a walk or something, as they will then fell
more confident about themselves. People suffering from Aphasia often think
that they are different from the others and are less inferior to them. Taking
them out will help them to practice understanding and communicating in a
real-life situation (Saldert, Backman & Hartelius, 2013).
 Be an alert, patient and attentive listener. Focus on what he or she is saying,
instead of in what they are not saying.
Online resources available for helping with communication barriers related to Aphasia
Firstly, social media sites are perfect platform for people with Aphasia, as here they
can post their massage in numerous ways. It is a indeed a great forum for them to build a
relationship with other people. Whether they want to communicate instantly or if they decide
to first craft their message properly, social media is providing them with ample of time to do
so, allowing them for this to take place naturally.
SCATM (Supported Conversation for Adults With Aphasia), is a method of
communication, which uses a set of techniques or procedures in order to encourage
conversation while communicating with people suffering from Aphasia, through body
language and gestures, spoken and written keywords, detailed pictographs and hand drawings
(Blom Johansson et al., 2013). It is designed particularly to help them to express their
feelings and opinions in a much better way, which will further make them feel heard and
valued and will encourage them to communicate more and more. By using this method, their

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partners (family members, friends, doctors and nurses) can help in breaking down the
communication barriers and can further help the people suffering from aphasia to re-join their
life’s conversations.
BCA (Better Conversations with Aphasia) is an intervention that is available online. It
is an e-learning resource that is freely available to improve the access to conversation therapy
for the people suffering from aphasia and their families and friends; for the language and
speech therapists (SLTs) and for the medics and healthcare workers who have to deal with
them (Best et al., 2016). Though this resource the speech and the language therapists will
have an access to the whole therapy program along with interactive learning materials and
will get advice and instructions from the experienced clinicians. They can also learn how to
conduct a conversation therapy with such clients. Furthermore, the people suffering from this
disorder and their families will get help in finding out what this therapy is all about, and the
perception of other people regarding conversation therapy. They will be then able to reflect
them whether it is right or not. Lastly, the medics and the healthcare workers shall be
benefitted from it as it will help them learn how this disorder affects the everyday
conversation of the clients.
American Speech Language Hearing Association is another resource available for the
same. It offers the people a wide range of information starting from language, hearing and
speech disabilities in both adults and children. It will full pack with numerous educational
information regarding the disorder of aphasia and its recovery process. With the same, the
National Aphasia Association is also one of these online available resources that promote
care, recovery and welfare of the people suffering from Aphasia via public education and
support of research. It further offers printed materials, newsletters and information hotline.
Some of the other resources include National Alliance of Family Caregivers, Aphasia Hope
Foundation, National Institute of Neurological Disorder & Stroke- Aphasia and National

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Aphasia Communication Tips. All these resources are available online for the access and they
all provides required help, guidance, information and communication tips for improving
communication with people with Aphasia.
Hence, it can be concluded from the above discussion that effective communication is
needed in order to deal with people having Aphasia. Only a communication that does not
make them feel inferior to others can result in positive outcome for such people affected by
this disease.

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References:
Best, W., Maxim, J., Heilemann, C., Beckley, F., Johnson, F., Edwards, S. I., ... & Beeke, S.
(2016). Conversation therapy with people with aphasia and conversation partners
using video feedback: A group and case series investigation of changes in
interaction. Frontiers in human neuroscience, 10, 562.
Blom Johansson, M., Carlsson, M., Östberg, P., & Sonnander, K. (2013). A multiple-case
study of a family-oriented intervention practice in the early rehabilitation phase of
persons with aphasia. Aphasiology, 27(2), 201-226.
Carlsson, E., Hartelius, L., & Saldert, C. (2014). Communicative strategies used by spouses
of individuals with communication disorders related to stroke‐induced aphasia and
Parkinson's disease. International journal of language & communication
disorders, 49(6), 722-735.
de Aguiar, V., Paolazzi, C. L., & Miceli, G. (2015). tDCS in post-stroke aphasia: the role of
stimulation parameters, behavioral treatment and patient characteristics. Cortex, 63,
296-316.
Goodglass, H. (2013). Diagnosis of conduction aphasia. In Conduction aphasia (pp. 49-60).
Psychology Press.
Saldert, C., Backman, E., & Hartelius, L. (2013). Conversation partner training with spouses
of persons with aphasia: A pilot study using a protocol to trace relevant
characteristics. Aphasiology, 27(3), 271-292.