RE: aphasic

[Garry Woessner]

That is a great question.  Any language impairment resulting from an injury to the brain would certainly be aphasia.  In terms of dysarthria, which is a muscular weakness and speech disorder rather than a language disorder, I don’t think you can, by itself,  technically code it as aphasia.   Fortunately for us (and unfortunately for the patient), dysarthria rarely occurs without a concomitant level of receptive or expressive aphasia, since dysarthria is typically due to an injury in the same area of the brain.   It is probably important for the SLP to test and document the degree of actual aphasia in these cases.      Garry L. Woessner, MA, MBA, CAS Woessner Healthcare Consulting Group 6602 Scandia Road Edina, MN 55439 952-944-5415 (office) 612-670-1956 (mobile) [EMAIL PROTECTED]   Confidentiality Notice:  This e-mail message is for sole use of intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information.  Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure, distribution or copying is prohibited.  If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by replying to this e-mail and destroy/delete all copies of this e-mail message.     -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of riversong Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2004 8:20 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: aphasic   Thanks Gary--So would all these disorders--dysphasia, dysarthria, and aphasia be coded as aphasia on the MDS if someone has difficulty speaking in such a way that they are not always understood? I thought aphasia was the absence of functional speech and dysphasia was difficulty with speech whether it was due to CVA, MR or CP. Am I way off? Becky