Talking more- does it help aphasia?

As a researcher in aphasia, I've been pleased to see a growing emphasis on 'talking more'. Stroke Foundation speech pathologist Alana Saunders recently wrote an article on the topic;

https://strokefoundation.com.au/blog/2015/11/12/living-with-a-communication-disorder-is-hard-work

We know that if you want to become a better piano player, you do a lot of practice, but does talking work the same? The answer lies in neuroplasticity, which enableme recently did an excellent podcast on;

https://enableme.org.au/community/podcasts

Neuroplasticity is the fairly new idea that the brain can recover from damage and rearrange itself. Not that long ago, it was thought that people with stroke could recover in the months after their stroke, then they would reach a threshold and stop improving. We know now that's not true! Many people with stroke make big improvements even a decade after their strokes.

Neuroplasticity principles say that if you want to recover a function (like language), you need to practice it a lot, and it needs to be practised in relevant environments. In other words, practising reading a bunch of words from a list is not as helpful as actually having a conversation with another person. You need to practice all the skills that go into a conversation, which can really only be practised by actually doing it.

So in theory, talking more in your everyday life should help your aphasia, but we haven't actually confirmed this yet. This is what my research is about. We have an app which counts your talk time and we set you talk time goals to try and reach. We measure your aphasia and other skills before and after to see if it works!

I'm currently looking for people with aphasia to be in the study from across Australia. We are offering $150 as an incentive to complete the trial. You can contact me here or at c.brandenburg@uq.edu.au for more information.

You can also try the tips Alana outlined, and ask your family and friends to support you in talking more, maybe by setting a weekly phone call or activity. Think of it like practising any other skill, we are calling it 'Communicative Fitness'.