Aphasia News

The Tavistock Trust for Aphasia Student Prizes

The Tavistock Trust for Aphasia has awarded two prizes to New Zealand University Students Meghann Grawburg and Kristy O'Connor.  The criteria for these prizes, quite simply, is that they should be awarded for an excellent ‘piece of work’ relating to aphasia. The ‘piece’ can be either for academic or practical work: an essay, a piece of research, clinical practice, conversation partner or similar scheme. It can be given to an under-graduate or post-graduate. This allows each University to adapt how the prize is awarded according to their own approach and programme. 

A little about the students...

Meghann Grawburg
Meghann Grawburg trained as a speech-language pathologist in Canada in 2004. She moved to New Zealand in 2007 to take a position at the Tauranga Hospital as a speech-language therapist working with people with aphasia and other communication disorders. In September 2009, Meghann moved to Christchurch to start her PhD at the University of Canterbury under the supervision of Dr. Tami Howe, Professor Linda Worrall, and Dr. Nerina Scarinci.  

Through her research, Meghann hopes to develop a better understanding of the impact of aphasia on the family members of people with aphasia. She will interview family members of people with aphasia to identify how their lives and their health have been impacted and develop questionnaire for screening family members who may need further services.  The title of Meghann's PhD research is "Investigating Third-Party Disability in aphasia using the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health.”

Kristy O’Connor
As part of the University of Auckland Master of Speech Language Therapy Practice (MSLTprac) course Kristy conducted a research project looking at the effectiveness of conversation training for General Practitioners when consulting with patients with Aphasia. This was a single case pilot study in which a GP in Auckland received a modified Supported Conversation for Aphasia (SCA) training programme. This comprised of a 3 hour one-on-one informal tutorial between Kristy and the GP. This included an open discussion around the facts of aphasia and the GP’s personal experiences with patients with aphasia. The Aphasia Institute instructional video was used to introduce the concepts of communication access and masked competence. This was followed by a discussion of the three founding concepts of SCA (skill and experience of the partner with aphasia, skill and experience of conversation partner, and availability of resources). The GP was also provided with a copy of the Aphasia Institute ‘Talking to your Doctor’ interactive picture resource for medical professionals.  

To evaluate the effectiveness of the supported conversational training programme the GP was filmed conducting a simulated GP consultation with a member of the local aphasia community. This was done both before and after the training.  Qualitative performance measures of the GP’s skill in providing supported conversation as well as the patients’ with aphasia level of participation during the simulated consultation showed positive results.  Following the conversation training the GP increased the use of facilitative communication strategies to provide and ascertain information from the patient. This in turn resulted in an increase in the patients’ participation in the consultation and access to medical information. Furthermore, the GP self reflected through a questionnaire an increase in her overall communication performance following training.

This research aimed to facilitate communication access and increase participation within a GP consultation for the local aphasia community. The next step is to extend this further, for example including a modified SCA training workshop in medical or GP training schemes, or as a training component of continuing medical education. With this we hope to influence the larger aphasia community of New Zealand.

The Tavistock Trust for Aphasia, based in the UK, would like to thank Nigel and Lynn Ross for their generous support of the New Zealand Student Prizes.