View clinical trials related to Aphasia.
Filter by:Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) has been demonstrated to improve language function in subjects with chronic aphasia in a number of small studies, many of which did not include a control group. Although the treatment appears promising, data to date do not permit an adequate assessment of the utility of the technique. The investigators propose to study the effects of TMS combined with Constraint Induced Language Therapy (CILT) in 75 subjects with chronic aphasia. Subjects will be randomized in a 2:1 ratio to TMS with CILT or sham TMS with CILT. One Hz TMS at 90% motor threshold will be delivered to the right inferior frontal gyrus for 20 minutes in 10 sessions over 2 weeks; language therapy will be provided for one hour immediately after the conclusion of each session of TMS. Change from baseline in the Western Aphasia Battery Aphasia Quotient at 6 months after the end of TMS treatment will serve as the primary outcome measure. A secondary aim is to identify anatomic and behavioral predictors of response to treatment. Finally, a third aim is to identify the mechanism underlying the beneficial effect of the treatment using a variety of imaging techniques. Subjects who have no contraindication to the MRI will undergo fMRI imaging prior to and at 6 months after therapy. Using modern network analyses and robust machine learning techniques, the investigators will identify changes in the strengths of connections between nodes in the language network to address specific hypotheses regarding the effects of TMS and CILT on brain organization that are associated with beneficial response to treatment.
This project aims to develop a clinically feasible version of a laboratory-developed assessment battery for language and verbal short-term memory difficulties in aphasia.
With the present RCT, the investigators aimed at finding an optimal protocol for the neurorehabilitation of chronic post-stroke aphasia by combining two promising methods, ILAT (Intensive language action therapy) and 1-Hz rTMS to the right-hemispheric homologue of the anterior language area of Broca (pars triangularis), thus taking advantage of recent research in speech and language sciences, neurorehabilitation and brain research.
Aphasia is one of the most common and disabling disorders following stroke, in many cases resolving in long-term deficits. There is evidence that intensive aphasia therapy is effective for language recovery, even in the chronic phase post-stroke. However, as many patients are left with residual language disorders and intensive aphasia rehabilitation is difficult to achieve, the investigators are exploring tablet-based therapies to further facilitate language recovery in a cost-effective manner.
Information regarding the likely progress of post-stroke symptoms is vitally important to stroke survivors to allow them to plan for the future and to adjust to life after stroke. Moreover, the prevalence of morbidity secondary to stroke is of central importance to Health Professionals to understand the prognosis of the disease in the patients under their care. Additionally, it will also allow commissioners of care, planners and third sector organisations to adapt to and answer the needs of a post-stroke population. Currently, the data collected by national audit programmes are concentrated on what can be termed 'process or process of care' data. The utility of these data are in the ability to audit the care received by stroke survivors on stroke units against evidenced standards for care, thus ensuring evidence based practice. Nevertheless, process of care is only one form of measuring stroke unit care and the audit programmes collect some limited functional status data, data relating to risk-factor co-morbidities and treatment received data. Therefore, the scope of this study is to build on the minimum data set currently collected and to collect post-stroke data in domains not currently collected. The International Consortium for Health Outcomes Measurement (ICHOM) takes important steps to collect data outside of process of care data such as a Patient Reported outcome data in their minimum outcome data set for stroke [currently under review].. Nevertheless, the ICHOM doesn't currently advocate the specific collection of data relating to cognitive impairment or emotional problems secondary to stroke. It is in these important aspects that this study will augment the data set currently advocated by ICHOM to collect data in the areas of cognitive impairment and emotional problems secondary to stroke. Therefore, the aim of this study is to quantify the prevalence of morbidity at six months post-stroke.
The purpose of this investigation is to examine the evidence on emotion, language, and music, and propose a first step, in the form of a single-subject research design, to determine the most effective and efficient method for application to the rehabilitation of patients with aphasia. A single-subject adapted alternating treatment design will be used to compare two music conditions, using music with sung lyrics simultaneously with reading of the lyrics, and priming with music and sung lyrics followed by a reading of the lyrics, with a control condition using reading lyrics without music. Results are expected to provide evidence of independent versus shared processing of music and language at the phrase level applied to the behavior of human subjects with aphasia.
One-third to one-half of acute strokes result in newly acquired cognitive impairments. Approximately 30 to 40% of people in the acute phase of stroke also sustain communication impairments. Stroke-related cognitive impairments are associated with significant functional disability, as indicated by the inability to regain independence in daily activities. The overall aim of this study is to examine the feasibility of an adapted form of strategy training for people with communication impairments who are admitted to inpatient rehabilitation. These analyses will address a critical gap in current rehabilitation research, namely the exclusion of people with communication impairments in acute stroke rehabilitation clinical trials, and provide pilot data to inform the design of future inclusive clinical trials seeking to reduce disability after stroke.
Previous studies have demonstrated that venlafaxine significantly improves the language function of healthy subjects and increase of fMRI activation in cortical language area. This study was designed to investigate the relationship between venlafaxine on the cortical language functional reorganization and clinical language improvements in the stroke patients with subcortical aphasia. It is a randomized, controlled, single-blind, longitudinal trial which has approved by the ethics committee of Guangzhou General Hospital of Guangzhou Military Command, and all patients and their guardian should sign an informed consent. The patients will divide into the venlafaxine group and the control group according to the principle of randomization (random number table). The patients in the venlafaxine group begin to take a venlafaxine hydrochloride capsule after enrollment ( each containing venlafaxine 75mg), qd, until 4 weeks after randomization, and the control group do not. Assessments of language functional behavior and examines of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) should be performed on the first days (V1), 28±3 days (V2) and 90±3 days (V3) after randomization. Through all this procession, we expect improve the language function of participants in experiment and clarify its mechanism,the research may help develop a new treatment for other patients with similar conditions.
Primary progressive aphasia (PPA) is a clinical syndrome characterized by the neurodegeneration of language brain systems. Three main clinical variants are currently recorgnized (nonfluent, semantic, and logopenic PPA). Nowadays, there are no effective treatments for this disorder. Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) is a technique based on the principle of electromagnetic induction of an electric field in the brain. It has been used as a non-invasive therapy in different disorders, such as depression, bipolar disorder, Parkinson's disease, and in the rehabilitation of post-stroke aphasia. Recent studies have shown how repetitive TMS improved language characteristics in Alzheimer's disease, and there are initial data in patients with PPA. This research project investigates the effect of repetitive TMS in patients with PPA. Investigators will perform a personalized TMS treatment for each patient (brain region, type of stimulation/inhibition, etc.), according to the specific characteristics of each patient and with the final aim to generate a computational model.
Every year thousands of persons suffer from brain damage resulting in anomia, that is, word finding difficulties affecting their ability to talk to other people. Anomia may be a result of stroke or of progressive neurological diseases such as Parkinson's disease or multiple sclerosis (MS). Word retrieval is dependent on a complex system of different neural networks and to name objects and activities can be affected to different degrees. The present project explores different aspects of naming ability in altogether 90 persons that has anomia related to stroke or to Parkinson's disease or MS. Furthermore, the communicative strategies and resources used by conversation partners in everyday conversational interaction and in care situations, affected by anomia are studied. Finally, the project includes a study of the effectiveness of a word finding training program based on stimulation of semantic and phonological networks in the brain, involved in the production of words. There is a lack of research on effects on communication from anomia in Parkinson's disease and MS and there is no research on anomia that investigates both object and action naming using a material adapted to the Swedish language. In the project quantitative and qualitative methods are used to explore and describe how persons with different neurogenic communication disorders can use different resources and communicative strategies to express themselves.