Role of Occupational & Speech Therapy in Stroke Rehab
Stroke is the leading cause of adult disability where the survivors face lots of issues like, unable to use one side of body, disability of limbs, speech impairment, facing problems in doing daily activities, etc.
Occupational Therapy is the only field which helps people across their life to do things they want and may be through therapeutic use of daily activities. Occupational by its name, it is clear that it refers to things/skills needs for occupations (work) to perform daily activities such as ability to maintain balance, concentrate, retain information, and even reach for an object. The goal of the therapist is to improve sensory and motor activities that are damaged to relearn these basic movements.
Speech Therapy is a technique to re-establish patient’s speech which they have lost after stroke. Speech therapy usually starts after stroke patient regains some normal speech patterns post-stroke. Speech impairment can have many forms which are grouped under general term aphasia. It is not that all stroke patients will experience aphasia, but it is estimated that around 40-45% stroke survivors will have some form of aphasia.
What Is Aphasia?
Stroke can happen in any part of the brain but if it happens in that brain area, which controls communication or speech, then this can cause Aphasia. Aphasia can affect speech, writing, reading, and general communication.
Benefits of Occupational & Speech Therapy
- Improvement in Quality of Life: The primary benefit of speech and occupational therapy is improvement in the quality of life. With the help of occupational therapy, patients sensory and motor abilities can be improved where survivor can relearn their valuable skills like cooking, using a computer, grooming, and other activities they do in normal life. Speech therapy helps in the improvement in the patient’s speech which they have lost after stroke.
- Learning strategies to overcome challenges: Therapists teach survivors to overcome the challenges via different strategies via practical strategies. They teach them how to divide the complex challenges into smaller parts to solve and overcome. Patients also learn how to compensate for their new abilities and strategize to overcome challenges.
- Coping with challenges and returning to routine activities: Therapists address the challenges brought on by stroke which may include physical, cognitive, and emotional challenges. Therapists help stroke patients to identify the activities they need or want to do and then will show strategies that help them return to most of their favourite activities.
Role Played by Occupational & Speech Therapist
These therapists are important parts of rehabilitation team. They assess, diagnose and treat issues concerning different daily activities, language, speech, voice, cognitive-communication, etc. They work towards reaching the best optimum level possible to improve and regain the lost activities to make patient more independent and ready for daily activities.
At NewRo Rehab Centre, our Rehabilitation team has very professional therapists that helps stroke patients to recover and regain lost things. Rehab has always helped patients to regain and making them more independent in their daily lives. It is very important to know that there is no late in rehabilitation, so if among in your family or friend circles have suffered from stroke and have lost the potential in performance of daily life, it would be a great suggestion for them to consult for rehabilitation that can make them improve quality of life.
