Examples of patients with aphasia to better understand this alteration

Aphasias can arise for various reasons and have different manifestations on the language of the affected people.

We are going to delve into this alteration to try to understand it better, to know what are the possible causes that can generate it and the consequences they have on the affected people, supporting all of this on a series of examples of aphasia cases that will allow us to visualize the problem.

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What is an aphasia and how does it originate?

If we want to know different examples of patients with aphasia, it is first necessary to know this term and its implications well. Aphasia is an alteration in the individual's ability to understand or use language, which can manifest itself in very different ways.

This difficulty arises as a result of an injury to the brain, either due to a pathology, such as a tumor, an infection, a cerebral infarction or even a degenerative disease, but they can also be caused by external aggressions, such as trauma. All these situations, if they affect a certain area of ​​the brain, can lead to some type of aphasia.

Although we will see it in depth when reviewing the examples of patients with aphasia, we must know that the brain areas sensitive to the development of this alteration, are located in the left hemisphere, and are usually Wernicke's and Broca's areas, mainly, although other regions may also be committed.

A person with a language disorder can express it, depending on the injury, in very different ways, from difficulty or inability to find certain words, trouble repeating sequences, difficulty in pronunciation, misunderstanding of words, disorder when speaking and many others. We will review these possibilities by focusing on the examples of patients with aphasia.

Different examples of patients with aphasia

Now that we have a first basis to understand the implications of this language disorder, we can go on to review the different examples of patients with aphasia. For this we will try to describe the main types that can be found regarding this alteration.

1. Example of Wernicke's aphasia

The first of the examples of patients with aphasia that we are going to look at is Wernicke's. It receives this name because it was caused as a result of damage in the Wernicke area, which, as we already saw, is one of the brain areas that are usually involved in aphasia, precisely because this region is one of those responsible for language.

A person suffering from Wernicke's aphasia will be characterized by having serious difficulties understanding language. Paradoxically, yes he is able to speak fluently, but only if we take into account the form, since the content is meaningless.

One of the most frequent mistakes made by these patients is to substitute some words for others that are phonetically similar, but whose meaning is completely different. This is known as phonemic paraphasia. This peculiarity, as we will see when reviewing this example of a patient with aphasia, makes it really difficult to communicate with them.

One of these people could say, for example: "I want you to have a face here to move a frozen shovel." The point is that the subject would not be aware that the sentence he has said is completely unintelligible. That feature It also generates additional frustration for patients, as they must deal with their language problem and a feeling of misunderstanding.

2. Example of Broca's aphasia

Continuing with the examples of patients with aphasia, we must now focus on Broca's aphasia, which together with Wernicke's, represent the two most frequent cases of these alterations. Broca's is an aphasia caused by damage to the region of the same name in the brain.

Unlike the previous case, these patients can understand language reasonably well (although they may experience difficulties), but the biggest problem is observed when speaking, since at the motor level they have lost or have seen seriously compromised their ability to pronounce the words.

Therefore, the patient would emit a telegraphic type of speech, using short phrases, which require enormous effort. With these conditions, what we would hear when a person with Broca's aphasia tried to speak to us, It could be something like this: "Plate, plate, table", instead of "You have to put two plates on top of the table".

We can see the difference between these two examples of aphasia patients. In the first case, speech is unintelligible, although the patient is unaware of it. However, in the second case, the person is aware of the effort and the difficulty, although he manages to emit a message, albeit brief, to try to express himself. The first is a sensory aphasia and the second a motor aphasia.

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3. Example of conduction aphasia

The next of the examples of patients with aphasia that we should review is that of conduction aphasia. This problem is due to damage to the temporal lobe. In this case, the subject would have no problem understanding language. Your difficulty would arise when trying to repeat a word or phrase.

Although sometimes they would be able to complete this task (with a lot of effort), the truth is that in most cases they would have serious problems, and they would end up using synonyms, phonologically similar words, and even words that do not mean nothing. To repeat numbers, they could also make the mistake of varying the order of the digits.

For example, when faced with the word "dog," the patient with conduction aphasia might say things like "repo." At the word “bicycle”, you could say “bideceta”. At the word "forty-two", you could respond with "twenty-four." Or, for the word "sofa," you could say "armchair." With these examples of patients with aphasia we can get an idea of ​​what speech would be like for one of these people.

This is one of the aphasias in which the subjects are fully aware of their difficulty, which generates great stress in them, realizing the mistakes they make and at the same time feeling a tremendous complication to correct them. This is an additional difficulty to several aphasias, as we have already seen previously.

4. Example of anomic aphasia

Continuing the list of examples of patients with aphasia, it is time to place ourselves in anomic aphasia. Anomic means "nameless." And it is precisely the problem that this alteration generates in these people is the constant forgetting of certain names, which causes them to constantly have to turn around in their speech to try to express their idea in different words.

In that sense, the patient knows perfectly what the concept he is thinking about is, he can even describe it, detailing it reasonably well, and yet is unable to find the word, that is, the language tag that is associated with that idea or object.

The fluency in the language is maintained at normal levels, always bearing in mind that the subject will not be able to remember many of the names and therefore will have to modify the speech, finding alternative ways to express what he wants to say. Your understanding of what other people are saying to you is not altered. That is, he understands language normally.

To see it in an example, we could think of a person who is unable to find the word television in his mind. You could say something like this: "Yesterday I saw a movie on the device where I see images and listen to sounds." Or: "Turn off that device." It is a somewhat milder form of aphasia than Broca's or Wernicke's.

5. Example of global aphasia

To complete the list of examples of patients with aphasia, we have to look at what is known as global aphasia. The name already tells us that this alteration is affecting all areas of language. Therefore, most likely, the patient cannot understand this element correctly, but does not emit it properly either.

Namely, aphasia would have affected his language in all dimensions. This type of serious alteration comes from a significant injury to the brain, which would be involving different areas related to speech and understanding. In the most serious cases, the person will not be able to utter a word.

In these cases, communication must be done through non-verbal language, consisting of facial gestures. and hands, and even intonation sounds to try and convey information that your lips cannot articulate.

Bibliographic references:

• Berthier, M.L., Casares, N.G., Dávila, G. (2011). Aphasias and speech disorders. Cognitive Neurology and Aphasia Unit. Center for Medical-Health Research (CIMES). Psychobiology Area. Malaga University.
• Cuetos, F., González-Nosti, M., Sánchez-Cortés, N., Griffith, H., Cabezas, C., García, P., Sánchez-Alemany, N. (2010). Types of anomic disorders in aphasias. Journal of Logopedia, Phoniatrics and Audiology. Elsevier.
• Damasio, A.R. (1992). Aphasia. New England Journal of Medicine.
• Vendrell, J.M. (2001). Aphasias: semiology and clinical types. Journal of Neurology.