Aphasia of head injured patients impedes rehabilitation program and social reintegration.

To Characterise the pattern of aphasia after closed head injury, this study was done retrospectively through medical records and aphasia test records of 42 closed head injured patients who were admitted to Severance Hospital between March, 1985 and August, 1991.

The results were as follows:

1) The total 42 cases were composed of 32 males(76.2%) and 10 females(23.8%) and the traffic accidents were the most frequent cause of head trauma.

2) Among 42 patients, Broca's aphasics were the most common(17 cases, 40.5%) and the global aphasics were the oldest patients.

3) The severity of aphasia was classified as mild degree in 20 cases, moderate degree in 8 cases, and severe degree in 14 cases and the severe impaired aphasics were the most common in global aphasics.

4) The mean duration of unconsciousness was 64.9 days. The global aphasics and severely impaired aphasics had the longest mean duration of that.

5) Nineteen cases of aphasics had dysarthric problem, too.

6) There was no significant difference between type of aphasia and the lesion site of brain.