What exactly is aphasia?

"Die Sprache zu verlieren ist genau so grausam wie eine Isolationshaft. Sich nicht mehr mit eigenen Worten verständigen zu können, berührt die persönliche Würde",
so beschrieb der ehemalige Bundespräsident Roman Herzog die Situation eines Aphasikers in seinem Grußwort anlässlich des 3. Internationalen Aphasie-Kongresses in Würzburg 1996.

Eine Aphasie (griech., aphasía, ‚Sprachlosigkeit') ist eine plötzlich auftretende Sprachstörung aufgrund einer Gehirnschädigung im Sprachzentrum,
wie sie z.B. durch einen Schlaganfall, Schädelhirntrauma, Gehirnblutung oder einen Tumor o.ä. auftreten kann. Die sprachlichenBeeinträchtigungen sind meistens sehr gravierend und können in unterschiedlichen Schweregraden einzelne aber auch alle sprachlichen Ebenen (Verstehen, Sprechen, Lesen und Schreiben) betreffen. Aphasienformen werden in vier unterschiedliche Syndrome (Aachener Aphasie Test) klassifiziert:

Global aphasia: Those affected can hardly speak or write. They understand little and cannot read.

Wernicke's aphasia:

The main symptom is fluent, excessive speech with many incorrect or phonetically distorted words. The distortions can occur so frequently that coherent information is no longer conveyed.

Broca's Aphasia: Characterized by slowed, halting spontaneous speech and short, telegram-style sentences (agrammatism) are characteristic. This is accompanied by great effort when speaking and confusion of sounds, as well as problems with the assignment of function words.

Amnestic Aphasia: The main symptom is word-finding difficulties. Language comprehension is usually barely impaired, but they frequently have to interrupt their speech because they cannot remember the word they are looking for. Often, the meaning of the word is described instead of the word they are looking for. However, this does not represent a limitation of intelligence! In Germany, there are 200,000 chronically ill adults, with 80,000 new cases annually, and 40,000 chronically ill children, with 3,000 new cases annually. Worldwide, more than 5 million people suffer from this disease! Aphasia has nothing to do with intellectual disability or mental disorder. Suffering from aphasia and its accompanying symptoms is a life-changing experience for the affected person and their family and friends.

Often these people withdraw into isolation because of their disability - this does not have to be the case!