Improvement in Symptoms, Processing Speed and Cognition in a 59-Year-Old Stroke Patient with Wernicke's Aphasia

Background: A 59-year-old, male, with a history of a left-sided MCA stroke, presented with right hand and face numbness, right hand weakness, incomplete Wernicke's receptive aphasia, and confusion. His Graded Symptom Checklist (GSC) severity was 78/162. Standard Assessment of Cognition (SAC) was 0/30. Trails A (TA) was unable to be completed within the two-minute time deadline. Processing Speed (PS) coding test was unable to be performed due to delays between each symbol.

Methods: A five-day multimodal program of receptor based neurological rehabilitation was administered three times per day, one hour per session. Each session consisted of electrical somatosensory stimulation on the second branch of his trigeminal nerve on the right and bilaterally on the third branch of his trigeminal nerve, vestibular rehabilitation exercises, therapeutic exercises, hand-eye coordination exercises, Carrick eye exercises, and off-vertical axis rotations.

Results: At the end of five days of treatment there were significant resolutions in GSC (-92.3%), improvement of SAC from 0/30 to 4/30, TA time from unable to be performed to completion in 69.4 seconds and processing speed of 15 symbols matched correctly from being unable to perform.

Conclusion: Short duration, multimodal, intensive programs of receptor based neurological rehabilitation may be a viable method to improve neurological integrity and performance in individuals with Stroke. The authors suggest further investigation into short duration, multi-modal, intensive approaches to restoring neurological function in individuals suffering from acquired brain injuries, such as stroke.