The Nature of Impaired Conversational Skill Following Severe Traumatic Brain Injury

Many communication deficits have been identified following severe traumatic brain injury (TB) in the adult population. Deficits range from motor speech disorders to word finding difficulties and impaired pragmatic skills. In the early post-injury period patients may be aware of motor speech difficulties but show little awareness of pragmatic deficits until several years later. In the long-term, conversational interaction is reported as particularly challenging for adults with severe TBI and those with whom they interact regularly. The primary aim of this study was to identify and describe those conversational skills that are reported by adults with severe TBI and their relatives to be chronically impaired