Aphasia Treatment with SentenceShaper

How can SentenceShaper help in aphasia treatment?

When people with aphasia use our software, they can take all the time they need to put together words. Often ordinary conversation goes too fast for them. When they use SentenceShaper, they use a simple microphone to record words onto the computer and then they can put the words together in the software.

Once they get the hang of it, our aphasia-treatment software can help them communicate.

Here is a real example, from a published research study. Several people with nonfluent aphasia (Broca's aphasia is the most common example of this) were taught how to use SentenceShaper. Then they practiced with it for about 15 hours in their homes.

Next, they were shown a program on video and asked to describe the story without using SentenceShaper. One woman said:

Ooh! A fish! Ah, water" and….uh mmm and attendant, "here," and bumped his head. "Oh boy, oh my hand, my hand, my hand.

Her description produced with the help of SentenceShaper was much clearer:

The boy and the fishmonger is taking the fish. The boy hit his hand.

More encouraging news: there is growing evidence, from published research studies, that SentenceShaper's effects can carry over into the person's regular, unaided speech after a period of fairly intensive practice with the system. That is, for some people, SentenceShaper can be a highly effective language therapy tool. Research studies are still in progress trying to find out more about the "who", "how," and "why" of these treatment effects, so unfortunately we can't make any promises about what SentenceShaper can do for a given person's speech, or exactly how to get the strongest impact from use of the system. You may want to look at the professional section of the website for more information.

If you are not working with a clinician,you can still use SentenceShaper. You may need some help in setting it up on your computer, but once it's set up, it is designed as an aphasia treatment tool that an aphasia survivor can use with little or no assistance (depending on skill levels). To see improvements in your natural, unaided speech, we recommend that you try to use SentenceShaper 30 to 60 minutes every day. Good exercises include retelling TV shows, news events, movies, or keeping a computer "diary" recording each day's events with SentenceShaper. Some more ways to use SentenceShaper are described below.

How can I use SentenceShaper in daily life?

There are several ways in which people can make use of the program in their lives, as well as using it for language practice. Here are a few suggestions, and if you have a speech therapist you can ask for her or his suggestions as well.

• Email these spoken SentenceShaper messages to friends and family as sound file attachments (the SentenceShaper Manual explains how to do this).
• Record SentenceShaper messages onto existing portable devices (such as MessageMate™) to carry them into "real life" situations.
• Play SentenceShaper messages to someone over the telephone (this allows you to prepare the message before actually making the call, and then just say "please listen").
• Give a speech! Some aphasia survivors have actually given speeches with SentenceShaper. For example, a book called The New Rabbi (Stephen Fried, Bantam, 2002: pages 149-50 and 262) describes two speeches delivered to over a thousand people by an aphasia survivor.
• Closer to home, you might want to create a birthday greeting, love letter, or piece of advice on SentenceShaper and play it for the person.
• Some aphasia survivors have used SentenceShaper to write (speak) a book,telling about their life story or their experiences as a stroke survivor.
• Make an electronic scrapbook or web page. SentenceShaper sound files can be linked with pictures in a PowerPoint presentation or posted on a personal web page.

Do note that the program is designed to be easy to use. Often if someone has aphasia as a result of a stroke in the left side of the brain where language skills are located, the person may also have weakness or other problems in using their right hands. Since double-clicking a mouse may be very difficult, SentenceShaper only requires single-clicking if a mouse is used at all. It can also be used on a tablet computer.

Aphasia treatment is about improving the ability of the person to communicate. Computers can be a wonderful help, as is the case with our software SentenceShaper. Aphasia treatment is typically an ongoing process over quite some time.