Treatment and signs of aphasia in childhood

Aphasia in children is much less common than in adults. But with such a disease, we are talking only about those violations that occur after the formation of speech, and its early development was at one time within the limits of the age norm.

Currently, 1% of children worldwide suffer from aphasia, among them more boys.

The causes of aphasia in childhood are the same as those of adults - tumor processes, traumatic brain damage, infections. Children practically do not have acute disorders of cerebral circulation in the form of strokes. The clinical picture of aphasia in childhood completely copies that of an adult.

However, there are certain differences in aphasia in young patients. They conclude that in the worst case, reverse development occurs quickly enough. The forecast is no longer favorable only if no positive dynamics are observed for several weeks.

Aphasia is a serious neurological problem and, despite the fact that adults have many forms of this disease, in children it is not really represented by so many.

Children who have not started attending school simply can not develop the same diverse number of speech disorders as they do in adult patients. This is due to the fact that the speech function itself does not reach its final development by this age, and therefore it is impossible to meet a semantic or dynamic aphasia in children, most often a motor or sensory one is recorded.

The younger the child with this type of impairment, the less pronounced and colorful the clinical picture of these disorders is observed. Therefore, the immaturity of the speech system is manifested in children in the form of limited changes that are characteristic for the manifestation of speech pathology in adulthood.

It is necessary to differentiate aphasia and alalia from children. In both diseases, deviations in phonetics, grammar and vocabulary are diagnosed, so it is difficult to draw a clear line between these deviations. The characteristics of the management of both those patients in early childhood and the methods of treatment are very similar.

The main difference is in the target trip to the problem. Alalikov disorders occur at the level of fetal development, so the goal of the doctor is to teach these patients speech skills, and in case of aphasia speech is disrupted after its formation, and therefore in the treatment it is a question of recovery.

Clinical manifestations of

The initial symptomatology of the disease can be manifested in the impossibility or great difficulty in selecting the right word or replacing it with a definition. This has nothing to do with the deterioration of the memory function.

Children with aphasia are disturbed by temporary perception, and they find it difficult to reproduce the sequence of actions, decomposing them in chronological order. Often, such a child does not enter into conversations on his own, and answers the questions in monosyllabic way, or refuses to answer at all, sometimes a sick kid can repeat the same phrase in any situation.

There are also variants of the disease, in which the child actively enters into a conversation, but to speak long, meaningless phrases consisting of a set of words. Children with aphasia can hardly perceive speech, which is addressed to them, especially if it consists of a set of complex turns and long sentences, but the work of the hearing organs is not violated. Short and laconic phrases are perceived much easier.

With the motor version of aphasia, the child fully understands everything that people talk about, but can not fully respond. He suffers not only speech, but also the possibility of writing proposals in writing. There is also an agrammatism - the omission of prepositions, the lack of use of endings for a bunch of words. Another sign of this violation is the insertion of short words that do not have logical meaning to any sentence.

If such a child is offered to rewrite someone else's text, then it will do so with ease. However, he can not freely express thoughts after reading or dictating. There are also difficulties in writing a free composition. Reading for him becomes also difficult. If aphasia begins at the age when the baby has not yet learned to read, then learning this in the motor form of aphasia takes a very long time and does not always lead to a positive result.

Diagnosis and treatment

The examination of children with aphasia is, first of all, in the detection of a pathological focus. For this, the brain is scanned. In this case, the treatment of the causes that caused such a deviation is of particular importance.

Therapeutic activities for such children include group sessions for the purpose of teaching letters and reading. Regular individual sessions with a speech therapist are required, his task is not only to teach children with aphasia speech skills, but also work with parents, training them to properly handle and perform exercises with the child at home.

Treatment of aphasia in children with damage to large areas of the brain is rarely very effective, positive dynamics result from the formation of new neural connections in the central nervous system, or the restoration of certain structures of the brain.

A very important role in the possibility of recovery is the help and support of parents, regular classes with the baby. It is necessary to constantly try to maintain the conversation, ask the child questions, carefully and without haste listen to his answers, give him the opportunity to make as much as possible everything himself, occasionally only providing little help.

With such a variety as motor aphasia, the child retains a critical attitude towards himself, he realizes that he is saying the wrong thing, and he can close up. Such a process will lead to an even greater aggravation of the problem. In order to avoid this, you need to study with a psychologist, which will help you gain self-confidence, and accordingly, and affect the opportunities for successful recovery of speech and writing.

Like the article? Share with friends and acquaintances: