Aphasia is a language impairment in adults which can be caused by various kinds of brain damage such as stroke, head injury, tumour or other aetiologies.
Aphasia takes many forms, and in the majority of cases, aphasia impairs all media for the use of language: speech, auditory comprehension, reading comprehension, writing and signing. Aphasia does not influence intelligence. Hearing is usually not affected.
Aphasia will in different ways limit the aphasic person’s possibilities to express his or her own thoughts and opinions orally or in writing. As a consequence the aphasia will affect the whole family and the total life situation for the aphasic person.
What kind of help does the aphasic person need?
A spontaneous improvement may occur shortly after a brain damage. However, the aphasic person will in most cases benefit from a well adjusted language therapy, individually or in groups, as part of a total rehabilitation programme.
The aphasic person needs help from a speech and language therapist (SLT) in order to:
- use as much as possible of the language (spoken and written)
- learn to handle the communication difficulties
Speech and language therapy should start as soon as the general health condition will permit, even when in hospital. Therapy should be continued after the aphasic person has come home. According to recent research language improvement may occur several years after the brain damage in certain cases.
Where to get help?
The municipality is responsible for establishing rehabilitation programmes for aphasic persons. The right to special education is founded in educational laws, which gives the person with aphasia a lawful right to speech and language therapy based on language assessment. All aphasic persons should therefore be referred to the PPS (Pedagogical Psychological Service) and to a speech and language therapist for an assessment. Usually the speech and language therapists at the various Adult Educational Centres provides the speech and language therapy.
The Aphasia team at Bredtvet Resource Centre offers support to the local authorities. Counselling will be given by the Centre if the municipalities lack sufficient competence to assess the aphasic person. The Centre may offer services directly to the user and/or to the family, local professionals and others. All the support will be based on individual needs. Services may be given locally or as shorter stays at the Centre. Bredtvet Resource Centre is not a rehabilitation centre.
Before the municipality/PPS asks for support from the Centre, the aphasic person must be assessed locally. Intervention must already have been started. A referral to Bredtvet Resource Centre must contain an explicit request for the support needed.
The Aphasia Team at Bredtvet Resource Centre can provide assessment and counselling based on a speech- and language therapeutic and linguistic perspective. We assess preserved and impaired language functions in relation to language production and comprehension, written and oral. The Centre will evaluate the intervention programme initiated locally and contribute with suggestions for further intervention to be given. Relatives and professionals will be given general as well as specific advice. In addition the Centre has competence in using Information and Communication Technology (ICT), which includes technological teaching aids for persons with aphasia.
The working methods and the services of a resource centre should primarily promote competence to the local support systems. It is therefore of vital importance for the user that cooperation is established between the local professionals and the resource centre. The cooperation includes both measures for the individual aphasic person as well as local competence development. The Aphasia Team at the Centre needs this cooperation in order to develop good measures for aphasic persons in general and to promote development in the field of aphasia. The Aphasia Team may in addition help to create professional, regional network.