Understanding, facilitating and predicting aphasia recovery after rehabilitation

Abstract

Purpose: This paper reviews several studies whose aim was to understand the nature of language recovery in chronic aphasia and identify predictors of how people may recover their language functions after a brain injury.

Method: Several studies that mostly draw from data collected within the Centre for Neurobiology of Language Recovery were reviewed and categorised in four aspects of language impairment and recovery in aphasia: (a) neural markers for language impairment and recovery, (b) language and cognitive markers for language impairment and recovery, (c) effective treatments and (d) predictive modelling of treatment-induced rehabilitation.

Result: Language impairment and recovery in stroke-induced aphasia is multi-factorial, including patient-specific and treatment-specific factors. A combination of these factors may help us predict treatment responsiveness even before treatment begins.

Conclusion: Continued work on this topic will lead to a better understanding of the mechanisms that underly language impairment and treatment-induced recovery in aphasia, and, consequently, use this information to predict each person's recovery profile trajectory and provide optimal prescriptions regarding the type and dosage of treatment.

Keywords:

• stroke
• aphasia
• rehabilitation
• recovery
• neuroimaging (anatomic and functional)

Disclosure statement

M. Varkanitsa reports there are no competing interests to declare. S. Kiran is a scientific advisor for Constant Therapy Health.

Additional information

Funding

The work reviewed in this paper was funded by the NIH/NIDCD [under Grant Nos. 1R01DC016950; 1U01DC014922; 1P50DC012283] and Boston University Digital Health Initiative.