Deciphering the mechanisms of phonological therapy in jargon aphasia.
Arpita Bose, Fiona Höbler, Douglas Saddy
PMID 30474174WHAT IT FOUND
For a man with severe jargon aphasia, phonological therapy improved naming on two trained word lists, but gains did not last and did not spread to untrained words.
Key findings
01AM named more pictures correctly with phonological cues than with control cues (34/175 versus 18/175), while semantic cues did not increase naming (26/175 versus 23/175).
02AM's therapy gains occurred for two of his treated word lists, but were not maintained and did not generalize to untreated items.
03In the retrospective comparison of three people with jargon aphasia, P9 showed no positive gains, FF improved and maintained gains, and AM improved but did not maintain gains.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
Therapy results come from a single participant, so they cannot show how PCA works for other people with jargon aphasia. The comparison with P9 and FF was retrospective and used previously reported data, not a new controlled study. AM was 15 years after stroke and had severe chronic jargon aphasia, so results may not apply to recent-onset or milder aphasia. The therapy study was a single-subject multiple-probe design, so it cannot compare AM's change with a group of untreated patients. Gains were only on some trained lists and did not generalize or maintain. The authors' recommendations about therapy candidacy and future research are expert opinion, not tested findings.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that PCA works for jargon aphasia because AM improved on two treated lists. His gains were not maintained, did not generalize to untreated items, and the comparison with P9 and FF was a retrospective three-case analysis.