There is a growing body of literature examining the utility of behavioral treatment in primary progressive aphasia (PPA). There are, however, no studies exploring treatment approaches to improve speech production in individuals with apraxia of speech (AOS) associated with the nonfluent variant of PPA. The purpose of this study was to examine a novel approach to treatment of AOS in nonfluent PPA. We implemented a treatment method using structured oral reading as a tool for improving production of multisyllabic words in an individual with mild AOS and nonfluent variant PPA. Our participant showed a reduction in speech errors during reading of novel text that was maintained at one year post-treatment. Generalization of improved speech production was observed on repetition of words and sentences and the participant showed stability of speech production over time in connected speech. Results suggest that oral reading treatment is an efficient and effective means of addressing multisyllabic word production in AOS associated with nonfluent PPA, with lasting and generalized treatment effects.

Individuals with primary progressive aphasia (PPA) suffer a gradual decline in communication ability as a result of neurodegenerative disease. Language treatment shows promise as a means of addressing these difficulties but much remains to be learned with regard to the potential value of treatment across variants and stages of the disorder. We present two cases, one with semantic variant of PPA and the other with logopenic PPA, each of whom underwent treatment that was unique in its focus on training self-cueing strategies to engage residual language skills. Despite differing language profiles and levels of aphasia severity, each individual benefited from treatment and showed maintenance of gains as well as generalization to untrained lexical items. These cases highlight the potential for treatment to capitalize on spared cognitive and neural systems in individuals with PPA, improving current language function as well as potentially preserving targeted skills in the face of disease progression.

There is a growing body of literature examining the utility of behavioral treatment in primary progressive aphasia (PPA). There are, however, no studies exploring treatment approaches to improve speech production in individuals with apraxia of speech (AOS) associated with the nonfluent variant of PPA. The purpose of this study was to examine a novel approach to treatment of AOS in nonfluent PPA. We implemented a treatment method using structured oral reading as a tool for improving production of multisyllabic words in an individual with mild AOS and nonfluent variant PPA. Our participant showed a reduction in speech errors during reading of novel text that was maintained at one year post-treatment. Generalization of improved speech production was observed on repetition of words and sentences and the participant showed stability of speech production over time in connected speech. Results suggest that oral reading treatment is an efficient and effective means of addressing multisyllabic word production in AOS associated with nonfluent PPA, with lasting and generalized treatment effects.