AAN 2026 | The prevalence and impact of post-stroke aphasia

Yeah, post-stroke aphasia is pretty common immediately after a stroke, but there is spontaneous recovery, natural recovery, weeks and months after a stroke. And so the type of people and the type of aphasia that we work with is chronic aphasia after months and years after a stroke. And the prevalence of that is relatively low, but we know that currently in the U.S., there are about 2 million people that have that residual long-lasting aphasia into the years after a stroke. So it is pretty common. It does have a catastrophic effect; it impacts everyday communication, so oftentimes people are not able to go back to work; they’re not able to communicate with their loved ones in the way that they used to, so it does really impact their day-to-day life. And people tend to think of stroke and physical disabilities, not being able to move their arms and their legs, and not being able to walk, but you can imagine that not being able to communicate and talk could have really lasting effects. And we’ve had patients who come to us, and when we ask them what it is that you would like us to work on, between physical disabilities and these hidden sort of language disabilities, people often say the language disabilities can be pretty catastrophic and pretty life-changing. And you can imagine that not being able to communicate could mean you cannot advocate for yourselves; you’re not able to share what your experiences are with aphasia, and so it becomes a really challenging disability.

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