[The effectiveness of drug therapy in the rehabilitation of patients with post-stroke aphasia].

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of the restoration of aphasic disorders in patients in the early recovery period of ischemic stroke (IS) who received complex therapy, which included speech therapy and injections of the drug Cellex.

Material and methods: The study included 62 right-handed patients with aphasia hospitalized in the acute period of IS in Ramenskoye Hospital, who subsequently underwent the second stage of rehabilitation in the neurological department of the Moscow regional clinical institute n.a. M.F. Vladimirskiy. Patients received rehabilitation treatment at both stages, including speech therapy sessions, and were randomized into two groups. Group 1 - 32 patients, whose treatment complex included two courses of injections of Cellex in the acute and recovery period (main group), patients of group 2 (n=30) received basic and therapy for secondary prevention of IS. To assess the condition of patients, the stroke scale of the National Institutes of Health of the United States (NIHSS), a modified Rankin scale, a screening method for patients with aphasia, and the Goodglass-Kaplan scale (GKS) were used.

Results: There was a statistically significant improvement in the neurological status in patients of both groups in both the acute and early recovery periods, and the shifts in patients of group 1 in both periods of IS were higher. After the course of treatment, a statistically significant regression of aphasia was noted: in patients of group 1, the score increased from 1 [0.75, 2] to 4 [3, 4] points, whereas in patients of group 2 - from [0, 1.75] to 3 [2, 3.75] points (p<0.001 between groups). Communication skills in group 1 patients increased from 0.5 [0, 1] to 4 [2, 4] points, while in group 2 patients - from 1 [0, 2] to 3 [1, 3] points (p<0.001 between groups).

Conclusion: As a result of the study, data were obtained indicating that drug support for rehabilitation measures with Cellex, carried out in the form of two consecutive courses in the acute and early recovery periods of IS, significantly increased the effectiveness of speech therapy and accelerated the consolidation of the speech network of the brain, obviously because of activation of neuroplasticity processes.