Aphasia Speaker:

Question 1

Broca’s type Aphasia (expressive)

Answer 1

• a problem with the spontaneous output of speech
• frustrating because they know what words they want to say but have difficulties
• also called motor, expressive or dysfluent aphasia

Question 2

Wernicke’s type aphasia (receptive)

Answer 2

• serious comprehension difficulties
• the ability to grasp the meaning of spoken words and sentences is impaired
• words they are producing are incorrect and nonsensical
• is also referred to as ‘fluent aphasia’ or ‘receptive aphasia’.

Question 3

What are some symptoms of Broca’s type Aphasia?

Answer 3

• Can have great difficulty forming complete sentences.
• May get out some basic words to get their message across, but leave out words like “is” or “the.”
• Often say something that doesn’t resemble a sentence.
• Can have trouble understanding sentences.
• Can make mistakes in following directions like “left, right, under, and after.”

Question 4

What are some symptoms of Wernicke’s Type Aphasia?

Answer 4

• Often say many words that don’t make sense.
• May fail to realize they are saying the wrong words; for instance, they might call a fork a “gleeble.”
• May string together a series of meaningless words that sound like a sentence but don’t make sense.
• Have challenges because our dictionary of words is shelved in a similar region of the left hemisphere, near the area used for understanding words.