Speech and language therapist in training!

The UTILISE team are very excited to announce that our wonderful intern, Tae Horsfield, has been accepted onto the UCL MSc Speech and Language Sciences programme! Tae will train for two years from this Autumn 2023 to become an NHS qualified speech and language therapist. After the enthusiasm, attention to detail, hard work and care that she has demonstrated in the months that she has been working with us, we have no doubts at all that she will make a terrific clinician.

 

Well done, and good luck, Tae!

Spring 2023 at UTILISE

It’s 2023! What have we been working on? 

Time for an update from the UTILISE team. We have been working hard over the past few months…

UTILISE 1 

Recruitment for our first trial, “UTILISE 1”, in which our participants travelled into UCL for 12 therapy sessions with a researcher, has finished. Fern, Claudia and Kerry have now finished collecting data; the next step will be analysing the results so we can understand how much the therapy helps and who might benefit from it the most. 

Our intern, Tae, has carefully checked videos of us conducting assessments, to make sure that all researchers have been doing the same thing and have not introduced any bias to the results. She has found that we have high levels of fidelity, which is important for the integrity of our research. Put simply, the test was conducted well.

UTILISE 2 

We have also been busy setting up for the next phase, “UTILISE 2”. We have been working hard with our software partners, Therapy Box, to turn the original therapy programme into an app. This means that people will be able to do the therapy by themselves, at home. With remote access to our tasks, participants can do the therapy from the comfort of their own sofas at times that work best for them.

Kerry and Fern have put together a PPI (Patient Public Involvement) group. People with aphasia and their family members are sharing their opinions and insights with us so that we can improve the research plan and better direct the research towards what people with aphasia want. We have had 3 meetings on Zoom, so far, and are grateful to those involved for their time and contributions.  

The future of UTILISE 

Rosemary, leader of the UTILISE team, has been putting together an application for future funding, which, if awarded, would help us to continue developing UTILISE in the coming years, and allow us to collect more data to increase the confidence in our findings.

In other news… 

UTILISE researcher, Claudia Bruns, welcomed the arrival of her second daughter, baby Millie, in October 2022. Mum, baby and family are doing well, and Claudia is enjoying her maternity leave. 

For more information on the work of the team: 

  • Watch this space for updates.

  • Get in touch with Fern or Kerry to learn about ways you could be involved. We have a waiting list for UTILISE 2, and are always keen to hear people’s points of view. We always take an evidence-based approach to developing our projects, but we don’t know what it’s like to live with aphasia first-hand.  

 

Upcoming Event- UTILISE Team at the UCL World Stroke Day Forum 2022

This Friday, the 28th of October, the UTLISE team will be at the UCL World Stroke Day Forum.

The event, sponsored by The National Brain Appeal, encourages an open dialogue between researchers, clinicians, charities, stroke survivors, carers and loved ones. It aims to empower stroke survivors and raise awareness about stroke research and rehabilitation at UCL.


The UTLISE team will be hosting an expo stall all day, giving interactive demonstrations of the new app-based therapy developed with Therapy Box. You will have the chance to see our automatic speech recognition technology in action.

At 11am, Professor Rosemary Varley, principal investigator of the UTILISE project, will deliver a 15-minute talk, “How do we provide effective aphasia rehabilitation?”, followed by a Q&A.

Rosemary will talk about developing the UTLISE app to allow individuals to self-administer intervention. Remote digital therapy approaches have the potential to increase therapy time whilst reducing costs. Rosemary will also address key questions such as what are the challenges of this approach from the perspectives of people with aphasia, family members and clinicians, and how might we address them?

Everyone is welcome so sign up to attend the in-person event here.

Can’t make it to London? Book a ticket to join online panel sessions to hear about UTLISE project and have the chance to ask any questions during the live Q&A.

 

UTILISE - Work Experience Recruit

The UTILISE team are excited to be working with Tae Horsfield, over the next year or so, as she gathers work experience on the project before studying towards an MSc. We’ll be getting Tae involved with a range of tasks, from transcription, to fidelity checks, to observation. In the short time she has been with us, she has already made a great impression, evidencing a diligent and thoughtful attitude. Here’s what Tae has to say:

I have recently graduated with a BSc in Psychology from Brunel University of London. In my dissertation, I investigated whether discrepancy scores between semantic and phonemic fluency tasks would predict the diagnostic status of patients groups suffering with various neurodegenerative diseases.

I have joined the UTILISE Project to expand my knowledge of acquired communication difficulties in older adults. Next September, I will be starting an MSc to further specialise in language sciences, neuroscience, and communication.

Congratulations, Sonia!

Sonia and Rosemary at UCL Graduation, Summer 2022.

Here at UTILISE we would like to celebrate the graduation of our fabulous intern, Sonia. She has completed a Master of Science degree in Language Sciences (achieving a Distinction, no less!), specialising in Neuroscience, Language and Communication. Sonia has also managed to secure a job working as a rehab support worker, a role in which we are certain that she will thrive. Sonia has shared a few words about her experience with UTILISE (copied below). We are wishing her all the best in her future endeavours.

“Dear UTILISE team,

I would like to say a huge thank you for the amazing support and dedication that you have showed throughout my internship!

Joining the project has been a great opportunity to acquire and develop new research skills, and contribute to aphasia research. I’m beyond grateful for all the input received and I feel so lucky to have been part of such a welcoming and passionate research team.

A big thank you to Rosemary for opening the lab doors and introducing me to her fantastic colleagues. Thank you Fern and Claudia for sharing your precious time and arranging several activities and tasks for me to be involved with. Thank you Jane for the expert advice and tips on how to read brain scans and localise lesions. And finally, thank you to my fellow intern, Ariel, for sharing this journey with me.

Now it’s time to move on to the next step in my career, working as a Rehabilitation Assistant in Early Supported Discharge for stroke. I’m thrilled to join the NHS workforce and support patient with their recovery after stroke.

I wish all the best to the team and I’m sure that our paths will cross again in the future!

Sonia”

MRI - What and Why?

On the UTILISE project we are collecting MRI scans of some participant’s brains, but what does that really mean, and why are we doing it?

MRI stands for “Magnetic Resonance Imaging”. MRI machines use a strong magnetic field and radio waves to form high-contrast pictures of soft tissue in the body, so it’s perfect for looking at the brain.

MRI scans do not involve radiation and is very safe for most people. However, because it uses a large magnet, MRI is not safe for people with metal in their bodies, for example pace makers, metal plates or titanium clips.

We conduct our scans at BUCNI (Birkbeck UCL Centre for NeuroImaging) over at 26 Bedford Way. When a participant arrives, we take them to the scanner and ask some safety questions. Once everyone is happy, it is important to remove all metal! This means making sure all jewellery is off, pockets are emptied, glasses are removed, etc. We then tape a vitamin capsule to the left side of the head, as this will glow bright white on the pictures and let us know we’re referring to the correct side of the brain.

The scanner is like a big tube, with a bed in the middle. We give the participant ear plugs (because the scanner is very noisy!) and help them to lay comfortably on the bed, with a blanket and some soft padding around the head. Once we’ve lined everything up, the bed slides into the tube, head first, but not all the way.

When someone is in the scanner, we can still communicate. They have a buzzer so they can let us know if they want to get out, and there is a two-way intercom system so we can talk them through the process. Whilst we are scanning, the most important thing is to keep nice and still, so that we take clear pictures. Some people can find it quite relaxing.

We are doing two kinds of scan: structural and functional. What’s the difference?

Structural scans are ‘still’ pictures of the brain, which show us where the stroke is. Hundreds of pictures are taken in ‘slices’ and stitched together to create a 3D representation of the brain. Using these pictures, we can identify which regions have been lesioned. This is important because it may help us to understand to whether lesion pattern is related to whether or not someone improves, or to what extent they improve, after therapy. Usually, people with aphasia have damage to the left side of the brain.

Resting state functional scans are like little videos and allow us to see how different brain areas talk to each other by looking at oxygenated blood flow. We are interested in whether patterns of connectivity are different before and after therapy.

This video shows a structural scan of one of the research team’s brains (non-lesioned), moving through the slices in each view: from front to back (coronal plane), from side to side (sagittal plane), and from top to bottom (axial plane).

Stroke Association "Amazing Brains" Event 2022

UTILISE project PI, Professor Rosemary Varley, and researcher Fern Rodgers, were thrilled to be able to attend this year’s Stroke Association “Amazing Brains” event (in person!) last week.

Three speakers, Dr Terry Quinn, Professor Audrey Bowen, and Professor Adewale Adebajo (MBE) delivered engaging talks with the central theme of thinking and memory. The speakers gave plenty of food for thought to the audience at the Francis Crick Institute, as well as to hundreds of people that tuned in online. The presentations were informed by both clinical and research understanding, as well as first-hand experience of stroke illness and ongoing recovery.

Thank you again to the Stroke Association for hosting and giving us an insight into other innovative research projects aiming to improve the lives of stroke survivors by recognising everyone’s individual needs. Fundraising is essential to keep such research alive, so please consider donating to the cause, if you can.

Upcoming Talk - Dr Amir-Homayoun Javadi at ASLTIP

From buzzing to talking; advances in effects of brain stimulation on aphasia

On Friday the 20th of May, 2022, our UTILISE collaborator, Dr Amir-Homayoun Javadi, will be giving a talk amongst other field-leaders at the Association of Speech and Language Therapists in Independent Practice (ASLTIP) conference 2022.

Claudia setting up tDCS brain stimulation on Amir.

Dr Amir-Homayoun Javadi is a senior lecturer at the University of Kent who has significant experience working with non-invasive brain stimulation methods. He, and our UTILISE MRI expert, Dr Jane Warren, are putting together a presentation that will discuss how stimulating the brain could help to rehabilitate language loss in post-stroke aphasia.

Claudia setting up tDCS brain stimulation on Jane.

Could brain stimulation help to “boost” the effects of therapy? Theories of neuroplasticity would argue that there is potential. Our brains are always changing, adapting and re-wiring as a result of our experiences. Even though stroke can cause irreperable damage to some parts of the brain, other, healthy brain areas can be encouraged to form new connections. Brain stimulation can excite the neurons and, potentially, help with this re-connection process.

Find out more in the talk. Everyone is welcome, so register here.

ASLTIP "Therapy Talks"

Professor Rosemary Varley at the ASLTIP “Therapy Talks” event (31/03/2022)

The UTILISE team are very grateful to the Association of Speech and Language Therapists in Independent Practice (ASLTIP) group for having us at their Therapy Talks event last week!

Professor Rosemary Varley, principal investigator of the UTILISE project, delivered a talk titled: “What’s new in sentence therapy for aphasia? “I don’t know””.

She gave a whistle-stop introduction to construction grammar, and spoke of how this theory informs our novel behavioural intervention targeting sentence rehabilitation in post-stroke aphasia.

Construction grammar suggests that we are able to store and access groups of words as single units, particularly if these phrases or sentences are “high frequency” (used often), for example: “I don’t know”.

This explains how someone with severe agrammatic expressive aphasia may be still be able to produce some grammatically correct utterances amidst otherwise syntactically disordered speech.

Using this idea of frequency, we are hoping to improve the accessibility and flexibility of these chunks in post-stroke aphasia.

“What’s new in sentence therapy for aphasia? “I don’t know””

Dr Anna Volkmer at the ASLTIP “Therapy Talks” event (31/03/2022)

Our UCL colleague, Dr Anna Volkmer, also delivered a terrific, and topical, presentation about Primary Progressive Aphasia (PPA), which is a language-led dementia, called: ““Will you still need me when I’m 65?” Dementia, language and speech and language therapy interventions”.

Anna raised the importance of taking a bespoke, person-centred approach to speech and language therapy.

For more of Anna’s work, see her recently published article: “Principles and philosophies for speech and language therapists working with people with primary progressive aphasia: an international expert consensus”.