Interventions in aphasia: an integrative review

ABSTRACT This review aims to identify, evaluate and discuss articles on aphasia interventions and therapeutic advances, published in scientific journals in the last five years. An integrative review was performed on databases SciELO, LILACS, CAPES and PubMed, with the descriptors in English and Portuguese: aphasia, rehabilitation and treatment. It was included articles describing aphasia treatment or rehabilitation case studies, published in English or Portuguese. The studies that met the criteria were read and analyzed according to an integrative review protocol, and then categorized. From the 96 studies found 26 were included in the review. It was observed a predominance of quantitative studies. Several studies that tested therapies showed positive results, confirming that aphasia is a condition that responds to a wide variety of treatments. Investigations focused on brain activation demonstrated significant correlations between patients' improvement and brain activation of language areas. It was found that aphasia treatments description did not indicate a superior therapeutic approach compared to another. Most studies did not present good degree of external generality, indicating the need for controlled studies with more representative samples. The current literature should support the actions of the professionals, nevertheless professionals should be alert to the characteristics and limitations of the protocols tested.