title: Communication skills and thalamic lesion: Strategies of rehabilitation.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To describe the speech rehabilitation history of patients with thalamic lesions.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Thalamic lesions can affect speech and language according to diverse thalamic nuclei involved. Because of the strategic functional position of the thalamus within the cognitive networks, its lesion can also interfere with other cognitive processes, such as attention, memory and executive functions. Alterations of these cognitive domains contribute significantly to language deficits, leading to communicative inefficacy. This fact must be considered in the rehabilitation efforts.
  
  
  METHODS
  Whereas evaluation of cognitive functions and communicative efficiency is different from that of aphasic disorder, treatment should also be different. The treatment must be focused on specific cognitive deficits with belief in the regaining of communicative ability, as well as it occurs in therapy of pragmatic disorder in traumatic brain injury: attention process training, mnemotechnics and prospective memory training.
  
  
  RESULTS
  According to our experience: (a) there is a close correlation between cognitive processes and communication skills; (b) alterations of attention, memory and executive functions cause a loss of efficiency in the language use; and (c) appropriate cognitive treatment improves pragmatic competence and therefore the linguistic disorder.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  For planning a speech-therapy it is important to consider the relationship between cognitive functions and communication. The cognitive/behavioral treatment confirms its therapeutic efficiency for thalamic lesions.
authors: ENT Department, University of Siena, Siena, Italy.
authors: Luisa
authors: L
authors: Amaddii
authors: USL 7, Siena, Italy.
authors: Santi
authors: S
authors: Centorrino
authors: ENT Department, University of Siena, Siena, Italy.
authors: Jacopo
authors: J
authors: Cambi
authors: ENT Department, University of Siena, Siena, Italy. Electronic address: d.passali@virgilio.it.
authors: Desiderio
authors: D
authors: Passali
mesh_terms: D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000628:therapy*; D003142:Communication; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D013070:Speech Therapy / Q000379:methods*; D013786:Thalamic Diseases / Q000628:therapy*
keywords: Cognitive function; Communicative skill; Pragmatic skill; Thalamus; funkcja poznawcza; podwzgórze; umiejętności pragmatyczne; umiejętność komunikatywne