Aphasia, is a language disorder caused by damage to the brain.
 
Colleen Kerr together with Sean O’Brien, Diane Finch and Bernard Chandra came to speak to us on Monday 8 February about the issue of Aphasia.
 
Read more to discover more about Aphasia
 
 
Aphasia is a language disorder caused by damage to the brain resulting from Stroke, Head injury, Brain tumour, Dementia etc.  Imagine waking up one morning having lost your ability to use and understand language.  It impacts speech, reading writing and listening but intelligence remains intact.
 
We were lucky enough to hear from Colleen Kerr (director of Optimal Speech Pathology) who has spent more than 30 years working with people with Aphasia. Colleen gave us an overview of the issue and introduced Sean first:
 
Sean had a background in lighting and spent his life travelling the world for pleasure and working for GE until in 2012 he had a devastating brain aneurism which rendered him unable to talk, read or write.
 
Diane spoke to us about her previous career in sales, business and politics prior to an accident in 2014 when a driver travelling at 150km/hr struck her car while she was in her driveway.  The rest is a blur until she woke in hospital 4 weeks later unable to speak or walk.
 
Bernard, our final guest was a sales manager for MLA holdings until he fell down stairs in his home and suffered serious brain trauma.  After months in hospital, Bernard was released and began the long road to recovery.
 
We thank our speakers for sharing information about the issue and the long road to recovery they all experienced. This goes a long way to raising more awareness of Aphasia.
 
[Thank you Alon for the write-up]