Broca’s aphasia
648 Views

GC: n

S: NCBI – https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMHT0027326/ (last access: 10 June 2017); APHASIA – https://www.aphasia.org/aphasia-resources/brocas-aphasia/ (last access: 1 March 2018).

N: 1. – Broca (pn): Paul Broca was a French pathologist, neurosurgeon, and anthropologist (1824 – 1880)
– aphasia (n): Loss of ability to speak, especially as result of brain injury or disorder, from Modern Latin aphasia, from Greek ἀφασία ‘speechlessness’ from a– ‘without’ + phasis ‘utterance’ from phanai ‘to speak’ related to pheme ‘voice, report, rumor’.
2. Individuals with Broca’s aphasia have trouble speaking fluently but their comprehension can be relatively preserved. This type of aphasia is also known as non-fluent or expressive aphasia.
3. There are different types of aphasia:

  • Global aphasia: This is the most severe form of aphasia, and is applied to patients who can produce few recognizable words and understand little or no spoken language. Persons with Global Aphasia can neither read nor write.
  • Broca’s aphasia (non-fluent aphasia): In this form of aphasia, speech output is severely reduced and is limited mainly to short utterances of less than four words. Vocabulary access is limited and the formation of sounds by persons with Broca’s aphasia is often laborious and clumsy.
  • Mixed non-fluent aphasia: This term is applied to patients who have sparse and effortful speech, resembling severe Broca’s aphasia.
  • Wernicke’s aphasia (fluent aphasia): In this form of aphasia the ability to grasp the meaning of spoken words is chiefly impaired, while the ease of producing connected speech is not much affected
  • Anomic aphasia: This term is applied to persons who are left with a persistent inability to supply the words for the very things they want to talk about-particularly the significant nouns and verbs.
  • Primary Progressive Aphasia (PPA) is a rare neurological syndrome in which language capabilities become slowly and progressively impaired, while other mental functions remain preserved.
  • Other varieties: Disorders of reading (alexia) or disorders affecting both reading and writing (alexia and agraphia), following a stroke. Severe impairments of calculation often accompany aphasia, yet in some instances patients retain excellent calculation in spite of the loss of language.

4. The lesion responsible is in opercular and insular cortex adjacent to Broca’s area or subjacent white matter.
5. Broca’s aphasia: Term recommended by the Medical Signs and Symptoms Committee (Canada).
6. Cultural Interrelation: Mentioned in House M. D. (episode 10 – Failure to Communicate, season 2; episode 12 – Chase, season 8).

S: 1. WNMDT – http://www.whonamedit.com/doctor.cfm/1982.html (last access: 10 June 2017); OED – http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=aphasia (last access: 10 June 2017). 2 & 3. NAA – https://www.aphasia.org/aphasia-resources/brocas-aphasia/ https://www.aphasia.org/aphasia-definitions/ (last access: 10 June 2017). 4. & 5. TERMIUM PLUS – https://goo.gl/1BpFXA (last access: 20 March 2017). 6. http://www.housediseases.com/episodes-9-122.html (last access: 1 March 2018); TMH p. 63.

SYN: motor aphasia, expressive aphasia.

S: TERMIUM PLUS – https://goo.gl/1BpFXA (last access: 20 March 2017)

CR: aphasia