Introduction
communication disorder, stroke, Post-stroke aphasia, aphasia, cerebrovascular disease
STROKE, CEREBROVASCULAR DISEASE
Post-stroke aphasia (PSA) is an acquired communication disorder caused by cerebrovascular disease damaging the language center of the dominant hemisphere of the brain. Patients with PSA usually have difficulty remembering words or lose the ability to speak, comprehend, read, or write. PSA is one of the most common and devastating symptoms of stroke, being present in 23%–40% of survivors [Patients with non-fluent PSA usually have impaired language expression but retain their listening comprehension ability [An important feature of Chinese idioms is that they have a complete and vivid story background. For example, “Yu Gong YI Shan,” it tells the story of an old man named Yu Gong who finally moved a mountain through his constant efforts. This Chinese idiom teaches people that success is acquired only through enough efforts. Therefore, in the context of one idiom, relevant words, sentences, and paragraphs can be expanded, meaning that patients with aphasia can train in the same story background with different degrees of difficulty. This expandable rehabilitation material may be applicable to the whole cycle of rehabilitation for such patients.Accordingly, this study aimed to explore an extension speech training program that takes Chinese idioms as context and expands them into characters, words, sentences and paragraphs and evaluate the feasibility and effectiveness of this extension speech training program based on Chinese idioms through randomized controlled trials. We hypothesize that the this program will be more effective at improving language function, as demonstrated by increased scores on the Aphasia Battery Of Chinese scale and the Comprehensive Activities of Daily Living questionnaire, than the conventional speech training program.