What type of allied health professional can assist a person to regain the ability to write, or communicate in some way, when they have lost the ability to speak?

Hi there,

I’m sorry to hear about your grandfather’s stroke and the communication difficulties that he is experiencing. From your description, it sounds as though he has a significant expressive aphasia/dysphasia.

Establishing a reliable method of communication, either through gesture, pointing, picture cards or a communication device, is often the most appropriate goal for someone in your grandfather’s situation.

The part of the brain that controls spoken expressive language is the same part that controls written expressive language, therefore it’s likely that he would have similar difficulties in writing.

Is your grandfather about to accurately point? Or respond ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to a simple question, either with speech, pointing or thumbs up/thumbs down?

If he can see the speech pathologist again, I’d recommend that you ask her to help you establish this basic method of communication first.

Modelling the type of communication that you want your grandfather to try, and then reinforcing any accurate communication attempts, will hopefully help him develop these skills.

For example, if he appears thirsty and is looking for a drink, show him a glass of water and ask if he would like a drink, if he indicates yes/no or points at the glass himself, give him the water the drink.

You may need to provide hand-over-hand support to point or gesture yes/no to begin with.

There are other strategies that you can try, however it’s probably best if we discuss these over the phone once we get a clearer picture of your grandfather’s communication.

Please feel free to call our StrokeLine team on 1800 787 653 (Mon-Fri 9am-5pm EST).

Best wishes,

Alana – Speech Pathologist for StrokeLine

Occupational therapists can also assist with learning to write with the affected hand or the other unaffected.

My partner has severe Disphasia/Aphasia since his stroke in September 2015, we have been working with a fabulous Speech Therapist - we used the public system and exhausted that service and then moved onto a private speech therapist who we were referred to - she comes to our home every week and has a thorough understanding of issues with speech and communication following Stroke and also has a great respect for our Neurologist who is treating my partner for seizures following his Stroke.  If you can find a great speech therapist it's worth the effort as we're been seeing fantastic improvement.