Recently the word “dysphasia” has been in the news, but most people have never heard the term and don’t really know what it is. Here’s some basic information about dysphasia.
The term “dysphasia” is a little-used version of the word “aphasia”. (Here in the United States, health professionals all use the term “aphasia”). Former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords was diagnosed with aphasia after she sustained a gunshot wound to her head. Here are 8 things you should know.
- Aphasia is a language disability that affects all aspects of language – understanding spoken language, reading, writing, and speaking. It is not simply occasionally stumbling on words.
- Aphasia is the result of a stroke, brain injury, or degenerative condition that affects the language area of the brain. While aphasia can be caused by brain disease, aphasia itself is not a brain disease.
- People with aphasia typically retain all of their other mental abilities. Memory, for example, is not affected.
- Aphasia can not be diagnosed by casual observation. In fact, casual observation is accurate less than 25% of the time. That is why formal clinical testing is required before the diagnosis of aphasia is made.
- Aphasia is typically diagnosed through formal clinical testing done by a certified speech-language pathologist.
- Aphasia that persists for more than a few days after a stroke or brain injury will continue to improve for years assuming the person is otherwise healthy. Watch how much improvement Gabby Giffords has made.
- Approximately 50-75% of people with aphasia are unable to return to the same type of work that they were doing before onset.
- Most people with aphasia face the prospect of losing their friends and becoming socially isolated.
I have known thousands of individuals living and coping with aphasia over the course of my career as a speech-language pathologist specializing in aphasia therapy and research. Most people living with aphasia lose their ability to command the language that they previously used to work and interact with family and friends. The loss of that ability is life-changing, and must not be trivialized.
Here at Voices of Hope for Aphasia, we work to help people with aphasia re-connect with their lives, and share the truths about aphasia.