Aphasia Therapy
Aphasia Therapy
Aphasia Therapy
Auditory Comprehension
2. Single-Word Comprehension
a. Pointing drills (severe comprehension issues, no phrase and sentence comp)
b. Match words to pictures; give definitions; synonyms/antonyms
c. If not work: short term memory tx; sentence comp; use of context
4. Discourse Comprehension
a. Client reads aloud a sample of discourse, patient answers questions
*Usually yes/no questions Discourse Comprehension Test (recognition)
* Sentence completion
* Open-Ended Questions
* Retelling
Speech Production
1. Volitional Speech
a. Sentence Completion: common to implied, can precede confrontation naming
for word retrieval
b. Word and Phrase Repetition: less powerful but fairly dependable (for little or
no volitional speech) For apraxia, weakness, paralysis, dysarthria. Can be used to
enhance processes such as word retrieval and sentence formulation. Gradually replaced
by vocab search and retrieval activities such as naming drills
c. Confrontation Naming: for purposeful retrieval, encoding, and production. Not
very functional
d. Cueing Hierarchies: Cueing evaluation: naming, try various cues for what’s
most effective. Train them to self-cue using best cueing techniques through naming
activities. The goal is to self cue to right word
Hierarchies:
• Imitation/Gesture
• First phoneme
• Sentence completion
• Spell
• Rhyme
• Syn/Ant
• Function/location
5. Connected Speech
a. Picture Description, prompting, procedural, and conservation
1. Patients act out daily life situations. Are encouraged to non verbally communicate and
enhance their comprehension of what others say by using the information provided by
others’ gestures and facial expressions and by situational contexts. Treat other
communication partners as well.
2. PACE- a) patient and client exchange new communication, b) clinician and patient
participate equally as senders and receivers of messages, c) Patient has free choice of
communicative modes used to convey a message, d) clinician’s feedback is based on the
patient’s success in conveying messages (responds by clarifying, asking, paraphrasing)
a. Clinician can coach on what behaviours the patient can use to enhance
communication
b. Clinician can teach specific communication strategies and use PACE to
incorporate them into the activities