ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses some of the available evidence indicating that pharmacological treatment using dopamine agonist makes an additional contribution to the conventional language therapy in selected patients with Transcortical Motor Aphasia (TCMA). On the contrary, in spite of having marked reduction in spontaneous speech some TCMA patients use volitional movements such as waving the hands or tapping the feet to prompt verbal output. Speech articulation is usually preserved, but emissions are variously described as soft, sparse, hesitant, laboured, or hypophonic. The presence of a moderate impairment in auditory comprehension is not a typical feature of classical TCMA and may be indicative of either extension of the lesion to the basal ganglia and insular cortex in cases with lesions anterior or superior to the frontal operculum. Based on the aforementioned studies documenting improvement in speech and language proficiency in cases of TCMA with pharmacological interventions, BS was offered treatment with bromocriptine.
