What Is Aphasia, The Condition Bruce Willis Is Diagnosed With?
Bruce Willis has retired from acting at the age of 67. This decision has come as a result of his aphasia diagnosis which will impact his cognitive abilities. After rising to fame in the 1980s through a comedy-drama series called Moonlighting and then moving on to doing iconic movies such as Die Hard, Pulp Fiction and The Sixth Sense, Willis has won one Golden Globe Award and two Emmys. Demi Moore’s statement said, “As a result of this (aphasia) and with much consideration Bruce is stepping away from the career that has meant so much to him.”
View this post on Instagram
What Is Aphasia?
Aphasia is a disorder that causes damage to the parts of your brain that process language. Usually, this is the left side of the brain. It can happen suddenly, either via a stroke or head injury. However, it can also happen slowly due to a brain tumour or some progressive neurological disease. The condition affects and impairs the patient’s expression, reading and writing.
View this post on Instagram
Also Read: Jada Pinkett Smith Has Alopecia. Here’s Everything You Need To Know About It, From Causes To Treatment
Causes Of Aphasia
Aphasia is caused when there is damage to one or two of the language areas of the brain. The most common cause of damage is a stroke. Other brain injuries can also include major impacts such as brain infections, gunshot wounds, progressive neurological disorders etc.
View this post on Instagram
The Types Of Aphasia
The two broad categories of Aphasia are fluent and nonfluent. There are subcategories in three two groups.
Wernicke’s Aphasia, which is also the most common type of fluent Aphasia. The patient may speak in long sentences that hold real meaning. They had unnecessary or made up words in there too.
Broca’s aphasia is the most common nonfluent type. People suffering from this understand what they want to say but speak in small and short phrases which take a lot of effort to produce. They might omit small words like “is”, “the”, “and” etc.
Patients who have global Aphasia face major communication difficulties and are limited in their speaking and how they understand and process language.
View this post on Instagram
Also Read: From Kristen Stewart To Timothée Chalamet, Oscars 2022 Red Carpet Was All About Glitter Glam, Red, And Bold Political Statements
Treatment For Aphasia
Speech-language therapy is used so that patients are able to regain their ability to communicate. Aphasia therapy focuses on reinstating a patient’s ability to communicate by enabling them to use their remaining language abilities and restore the language abilities they’ve lost, as much as possible. They are also taught other ways to communicate such as gestures or electronic devices. Individual therapy focuses on a patient’s specific needs while group therapy offers them the chance to use their newfound communication skills in a group setting. According to sources, there are also recent technologies such as “virtual” speech therapists which enable patients to get speech therapy from their homes
