Development of a mobile application to improve the quality of life of the most vulnerable group in society, i.e. elderly people affected by aphasia.

Project description

Aphasia is a loss of the ability to understand and produce speech due to damage to the brain (central nervous system). People with aphasia lose all or part of their ability to communicate. They are mainly elderly people after a stroke which is the most common cause of this ailment. The subject of this project is to develop a mobile application designed to support rehabilitation and linguistic communication of elderly people suffering from aphasia. The application is designed for speech therapists providing services to people with aphasia, as well as for patients with aphasia themselves, in order to exercise and directly support their communication in everyday situations. The aim of the application is to increase the effectiveness of speech therapy for people with aphasia, to encourage them to participate actively in social life, and to initiate and maintain social contacts. Research shows that aphasia therapy supported by multimedia tools increases the speed and effectiveness of the learning of speech therapy material by 60 percent as compared to traditional methods. Due to its wide range of functionalities, the application will be a novelty on the Polish market. The main innovative feature is the use on mobile devices, which allows the patients to do exercises using microphone with no need to access a computer. An additional feature allows the user to document meetings of aphasia patients in group therapy.