Choir Singing in Aphasia Rehabilitation

Summary

This study evaluates the verbal, cognitive, emotional, and neural efficacy of a choir singing intervention in chronic aphasic patients and their caregivers. Using a cross-over RCT design, half of the participants receive a 4-month singing intervention during the first half of the study and half of the participants during the second half of the study.

Conditions

• Stroke
• Aphasia

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Singing-based rehabilitation

The singing-based rehabilitation is a combination of group-training (16 weeks, 1 x week, 90 min), which utilizes a novel combination of traditional senior choir singing and singing-based speech training protocols, and home training (16 weeks, ≥ 3 x week, ≥ 30 min) in which the choir material is trained with a tablet computer.

OTHER

Standard care

Standard care comprises all rehabilitation and care services (e.g. speech therapy, physical and occupational therapy, neuropsychological rehabilitation) received by the patients in the Finnish health care system

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Helsinki University Central Hospital

  collaborator OTHER

• Hospital District of Helsinki and Uusimaa

  collaborator OTHER

• Helsinki-Uusimaa Aphasia and Stroke Association

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Finnish Brain Association

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Outloud Ltd

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• University of Barcelona

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Melbourne

  collaborator OTHER

• Harvard Medical School (HMS and HSDM)

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Helsinki

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Teppo Särkämö, PhD · University of Helsinki

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

SINGLE

Model

CROSSOVER

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2018-01-01

Primary Completion

2020-01-31

Completion

2020-03-15

Countries

• Finland

Study Locations