Treatment Response to a Double Administration of Constraint-Induced Language Therapy in Chronic Aphasia.
Jennifer Mozeiko, Emily B Myers, Carl A Coelho
PMID 29872835WHAT IT FOUND
Repeating 30 hours of intensive language therapy added little to standardized scores, but participants with mild aphasia generalized gains to untrained words.
Those with severe aphasia improved on naming tests without gaining new skills. Second rounds may not be worth the time.
Key findings
01Participants with mild aphasia generalized treatment gains to untrained words, whereas those with severe aphasia did not.
02The second round of therapy did not produce additional gains on the main severity measure for any participant.
03Gains were maintained at the 8-week follow-up for all four participants.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
Only four participants were studied, so results cannot be generalized. The first author administered both the treatment and the outcome probes, which could introduce bias. Participants with severe aphasia did not master the treatment levels, making it hard to judge the full effect of the second block. Repeated testing may have caused practice effects, especially for the participants with mild aphasia who were near ceiling on standardized tests.
Declared interests
Funded by the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD).
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume that adding a second block of CILT is universally beneficial. It did not improve the primary severity score for any participant, and its value appears limited to generalization in those with mild aphasia.