More than thirty percent of people who survive a stroke on the left side of their brain wind up with speech impairments. A recent study reported in the June, 2005 issue of the American Heart Association's Stroke magazine found that short term speech therapy for these stroke patients can be more effective than therapy spread out over the course of a year (the normal time for such treatment).

The research was done at the Universitat Konstanz in Konstanz, Germany. The researchers used language games and concentrated verbal communication training, or CIAT (constrain-induced aphasia therapy). Stroke patients were taught to speak more, instead of utilizing gestures.

Eighty-five percent of the patients in the study improved their ability to speak and maintained that ability for six months. These improvements happened regardless of the study participants' ages. The study found further that family members and friends gave additional training in speech to fifteen patients helped improved those patients' speaking abilities.