We studied the effects of an intensive poststroke phonological rehabilitation program on speech/language production in a subject with alexia and aphasia. In a single-subject design context, we studied whether treatment improved phonological processing, reading, and generalization to untreated behaviors.

While results showed a lack of generalization to real-word reading aloud, improvement was present in phonological processing, language function, and auditory processing.

Improvement in the lexical-semantic system was attributed to informal forced-use language treatment. Results showed slight improvement in phonological function and clinically significant gains in the lexical-semantic system.

We concluded that phonological therapies are likely to be unsuccessful if a minimum level of phonological sequence knowledge does not exist; therapies that pressure subjects to communicate verbally can achieve clinically important gains in communicative ability.

This study also demonstrated the importance of a careful analysis of the patient's language ability before choosing a therapeutic strategy.

Treatability of different components of aphasia-Insights from a case study, pg. 323 (PDF)

The Journal of Rehabilitation Research and Development (JRRD) has been a leading research journal in the field of rehabilitation medicine and technology for over 40 years. Formerly the Bulletin of Prosthetics Research, JRRD debuted in 1983 to include cross-disciplinary findings in rehabilitation. JRRD, a scientifically indexed journal, publishes original research papers, review articles, as well as clinical and technical commentary from U.S. and international researchers on all rehabilitation research disciplines.
www.vard/jour/jourindx.htm