Victoria Zakopoulou¹*, Labrini Magou², Konstantinos Tsamis³, Nefeli Dimitriou⁴, Glykeria Loli⁴, Iliana Kolotoura⁴, Vasiliki Kostadima5 and Avraam Ploumis⁶

¹Associate Professor, Department of Speech and Language Therapy, Laboratory of New Approaches in Communication Disorders, University of Ioannina, Ioannina, Greece
²MSc, Logotherapist, University Hospital of Ioannina, Physical Medicine, and Rehabilitation ‘S. Niarchos’, Ioannina, Greece
³Assistant Professor, Laboratory of Physiology, Faculty of Medicine, School of Health Sciences, University of Ioannina, Ioannina, Greece
⁴Logotherapist, Department of Speech and Language Therapy, Laboratory of New Approaches in Communication Disorders, University of Ioannina, Ioannina, Greece
⁵Consultant Neurologist, University Hospital of Ioannina, Clinic of Neurology, Ioannina, Greece
⁶Professor, Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Medicine, School of Health Sciences, University of Ioannina, Ioannina, Greece

*Corresponding Author: Victoria Zakopoulou, Associate Professor, Department of Speech and Language Therapy, Laboratory of New Approaches in Communication Disorders, University of Ioannina, Ioannina, Greece.

Received: November 22, 2022; Published: December 12, 2022

Abstract

Introduction: Acquired reading and writing difficulties, characterized as acquired dyslexia (AD) and dysgraphia (ADg), are potentially unique patterns of communication disabilities observed after traumatic and non-traumatic brain disorders (T-nTBDs).

Objectives: In this study, we investigated whether a very early differential diagnosis between AD/ADg and Aphasia is attainable. We sought to form, analyze, and interpret well-defined AD/ADg, aphasia-differentiated, diagnostic profiles.

Methods: A total of 23 Greek patients with T-nTBDs, with no previous history of language disabilities, were recruited. All patients were administered the Western Aphasia Battery (WAB) and Dyslexia Adults Screening Test (DAST), before and six months after completing a systematic rehabilitation program. Results: 24% of patients were diagnosed with AD/ADg as the predominant disorder at two testing stages, while surface AD/ADg types were underlined. In both testing stages, the highest ‘At-Risk’ for Dyslexia Quotient was recorded in the domains of reading, writing, spelling, and rapid naming. Statistically significant correlations were also observed between these domains. After a six months speech and language therapy not tailored to AD/ADg difficulties, identical reading and writing deficits to the baseline examination were observed.

Conclusions: The findings showed that a number of patients with T-nTBDs exhibit unique AD and ADg patterns, aphasia differentiated, and potentially identified at a very early diagnostic stage. They underlined specific skills affected, highlighting a system of complex interactions in the lexical retrieval route of the reading and writing process, reflecting surface dyslexia and dysgraphia. Such findings particularly emphasize the importance of developing effective, AD/ADg oriented treatments.

Keywords: Traumatic and Non-Traumatic Brain Disorders; Aphasia; Acquired Dyslexia; Differential Diagnosis

References

<
1. Giustini A., et al. “Traumatic and nontraumatic brain injury”. In: Handbook of Clinical Neurology (2013): 401-409.
2. Brookshire CE., et al. “Frequency, nature, and predictors of alexia in a convenience sample of individuals with chronic Aphasia”. Aphasiology12 (2014): 1464-1480.
3. Cistola G., et al. “Aphasia and acquired reading impairments: What are the high‐tech alternatives to compensate for reading deficits?” International Journal of Language and Communication Disorders1 (2021): 161-173.
4. Vuković M., et al. “Acquired dyslexia in Serbian speakers with Broca’s and Wernicke’s Aphasia”. Journal of Communication Disorders 61 (2016): 106-118.
5. Davis G. “Aphasiology: Disorders and Clinical Practice”. 2^nd New York: Pearson (2007).
6. LaPointe L. “Aphasia and Related Neurogenic Language Disorders”. 3^rd New York: Thieme (2005).
7. Riley EA and Thompson CK. "Semantic typicality effects in acquired dyslexia: Evidence for semantic impairment in deep dyslexia”. Aphasiology 6-8 (2010): 802-813.
8. Zabell C and Everatt J. “Surface and phonological subtypes of adult developmental dyslexia”. Dyslexia 3 (2002): 160-177.
9. Brousseau G., et al. “An investigation into early acquired dyslexia”. Neurocase2 (2009): 126-134.
10. Elliott J and Grigorenko E. “The Dyslexia Debate”. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (2014).
11. Hamilton AC and Coslett HB. “Role of inflectional regularity and semantic transparency in reading morphologically complex words: Evidence from acquired dyslexia”. Neurocase4 (2008): 347-368.
12. Samuelsson S. “Converging evidence for the role of occipital regions in orthographic processing: a case of developmental surface dyslexia”. Neuropsychologia4 (2000): 351-362.
13. Coltheart M., et al. “Surface Dyslexia”. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology Section A3 (1983): 469-495.
14. Fridriksson J., et al. “Anatomy of Aphasia revisited”. Brain3 (2018): 848-862.
15. Tiu JB and Carter AR. “Agraphia”. In: StatPearls. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing (2021).
16. Baxter DM and Warrington EK. “Category specific phonological dysgraphia”. Neuropsychologia 5 (1985): 653-666.
17. World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki: Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects”. JAMA20 (2013): 2191.
18. Fawcett A and Nicolson R. “The Dyslexia Adult Screening Test (DAST)”. United Kingdom: Pearson Education (1998).
19. Kertesz A. “Western Aphasia Battery-Revised”. American Psychological Association (2012).
20. Tafiadis D and Gavriilidou EKK. “The Western Aphasia Battery - Revised (WAB - R): Pilot study and validation in normal Greek Population”. Figshare (2017).
21. Woollams AM. “Connectionist neuropsychology: uncovering ultimate causes of acquired dyslexia”. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 1634 (2014): 20120398.
22. Teichmann M., et al. “Does surface dyslexia/dysgraphia relate to semantic deficits in the semantic variant of primary progressive Aphasia?” Neuropsychologia 135 (2019): 107241.
23. Zirkel P. “Students with Acquired Brain Injury: A Legal Analysis”. 30 (Physical Disabilities: Education and Related Services) (2011): 23-47.
24. Beeson PM and Insalaco D. “Acquired alexia: Lessons from successful treatment”. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society6 (1998): 621-635.
25. Weekes BS. “Acquired Disorders of Reading and Writing: Cross-Script Comparisons”. Behavioural Neurology2-3 (2005): 51-57.
26. Pedersen PM., et al. “Aphasia after Stroke: Type, Severity and Prognosis”. Cerebrovascular Diseases 1 (2004): 35-43.
27. Araújo S., et al. “What Underlies the Deficit in Rapid Automatized Naming (RAN) in Adults with Dyslexia? Evidence from Eye Movements”. Scientific Studies of Reading (2020): 1-16.
28. Gvion A and Friedmann N. “Phonological short-term memory in conduction Aphasia”. Aphasiology 3-4 (2012): 579-614.
29. Perera H., et al. “Review of EEG-based pattern classification frameworks for dyslexia”. Brain Infection2 (2010): 4.
30. Roth F and Worthington C. “Treatment Resource Manual for Speech Language Pathology”. 5^th United States of America: Delmar Cengage Learning (2015).
31. Zhang Y., et al. “Study on the pathogenic mechanism of Broca’s and Wernicke’s Aphasia”. Neurological Research1 (2006): 59-65.
32. Blazely AM., et al. “Semantic impairment with and without surface dyslexia: Implications for models of reading”. Cognitive Neuropsychology 6 (2005): 695-717.
33. Douklias SD., et al. “Surface and phonological developmental dyslexia in Greek”. Cognitive Neuropsychology 8 (2009): 705-723.
34. Carthery-Goulart MT and Senaha MLH. “Diagnosis and rehabilitation attempt of a patient with acquired dyslexia”. Dementia and Neuropsychologia 1 (2007): 89-96.
35. Chitiri HF and Willows DM. “Word recognition in two languages and orthographies: English and Greek”. Memory and Cognition 3 (1994): 313-325.
36. Protopapas A., et al. “IPLR: an online resource for Greek word-level and sublexical information”. Lang Resources and Evaluation3 (2012): 449-459.
37. Protopapas A and Vlahou EL. “A comparative quantitative analysis of Greek orthographic transparency”. Behavior Research Methods4 (2009): 991-1008.
38. Ralli A. “Review article: Morphology in Greek Linguistics: The State of the Art”. J Greek Linguist 1 (2003): 77-129.
39. Dryer MS. “The WALS author team. Language page for Greek (Modern). In: The world atlas of language structures online”. Munich, Germany: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (2011).
40. Chliounaki K and Bryant P. “Construction and learning to spell”. Cognitive Development3-4 (2002): 1489-1499.
41. Protopapas A. “Learning to read Greek. In: Learning to read across languages and writing systems”. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press (2017): 181-210.
42. Coltheart M., et al. “DRC: A dual route cascaded model of visual word recognition and reading aloud”. Psychological Review1 (2001): 204-256.
43. Behrmann M and Bub D. “Surface dyslexia and dysgraphia: dual routes, single lexicon”. Cognitive Neuropsychology3 (1992): 209-251.
44. Dignam J., et al. “Influence of Cognitive Ability on Therapy Outcomes for Anomia in Adults With Chronic Poststroke Aphasia”. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research 2 (2017): 406-421.
45. Schumacher R., et al. “Assessing and mapping language, attention and executive multidimensional deficits in stroke Aphasia”. Brain10 (2019): 3202-3216.
46. Akkad H., et al. “Mapping language and non-language cognitive deficits in post-stroke anomic Aphasia”. Neuroscience (2021).
47. Kirsher Wilson. “Aphasia and Aphasic Syndromes”. In: Bradley and Daroff’s Neurology in Clinical Practice. 8^th Elsevier (2021): 133-148.
48. Ellis AW., et al. “Modes of word recognition in the left and right cerebral hemispheres”. Brain and Language2 (1988): 254-273.
49. Morello García F., et al. “Acquired surface dysgraphia and dyslexia in the semantic variant of primary progressive Aphasia: a single-case study in Spanish”. Aphasiology6 (2021): 783-804.
50. Wing AM and Baddeley AD. “Righting errors in writing errors: The Wing and Baddeley (1980) spelling error corpus revisited”. Cognitive Neuropsychology 2 (2009): 223-226.

Citation

Citation: Zakopoulou, V., et al. “Identifying Acquired Dyslexia and Dysgraphia Patterns in Greek Patients After Traumatic and Non-Traumatic Brain Disorders". Acta Acta Scientific Neurology 6.1 (2023): 43-53.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2023 Zakopoulou, V., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.