Scale for Assessment of Conversation Impairment in Individuals with Traumatic Brain Injury

Abstract

Impairment in conversation is one of the persisting, subtle and sub clinical feature reported in TBI individuals even after months of recovery from the medical ailments. The study attempted to describe the propositional and non propositional aspects of conversational speech in TBI individuals in the discourse mode of conversation and compared the same with that of normal control subjects. Eight adult TBI individuals and age, gender and education matched normal subjects were taken for the study. The TBI individuals with a minimum of 6 months after the accident and with no aphasia (as per the testing) were included. Conversation on various topics was recorded and transcribed. A severity rating scale was developed to rate the conversation impairment in discourse in these individuals. Results show that there is impairment in various aspects of discourse in TBI individuals as compared to normal subjects.