iPad for stroke patient?

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Level 1

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iPad for stroke patient?

A friend recently had a massive stroke and at the moment is unable to speak. He does have use of his right hand and arm and is communicating by pointing at letters on a board. His vision is affected so the letters have to be large. His biggest gripe at the moment is that he is bored, bored, bored.

I was wondering if an Pad would be useful in communicatng as word processing can be set to some sort of predictive text, speeding things up for him. He gets very frustrated at communicating so slowly at the moment.

Could someone out there with an iPad try this and see if it would work for him. The letters would need to be large, about an inch and the words would only need to be displayed one at a time, rather than a whole page of text.

Thanks

Posted on Sep 12, 2010 3:36 AM

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Answer 1

Sep 12, 2010 4:50 AM in response to Trixie64

Hi and welcome to Apple Discussions...

This link may provide some answers for you. iPad: Configuring accessibility features (including VoiceOver and Zoom)

"iPad includes the following accessibility features, which are designed to make it easier for users with visual, auditory, or other physical disabilities to use iPad."

In order to "Zoom" one would need to "double-tap" the screen using three fingers at the same time or to change the Zoom, using three fingers, double-tap and drag up and down.

My experience with this using the pre-installed Notes application is that the Zoom will not increase to an inch in size nor would words be displayed one at a time.

However, for "boredom"... one can enable "VoiceOver". VoiceOver speaks items on the screen by "touching" that item, or double-tapping, or "flicking three fingers" to scroll.

My suggestion to you is to find a friend with an iPad to see if these features will meet the requirements your friend needs. Either that, if you can, visit an Apple store.

Carolyn 🙂

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Answer 2

Alancito

Level 7

27,382 points

Sep 12, 2010 5:05 AM in response to Trixie64

Trixie ~ These articles list some apps for those who've had strokes or have other communication difficulties:

10-revolutionary-ipad-apps

_The iPad: a Near-Miracle_

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Answer 3

Ashka

Level 4

3,885 points

Sep 12, 2010 3:15 PM in response to Trixie64

This site might help:
http://www.physorg.com/news190805040.html
Quote:
A company called AssistiveWare has already adapted for the iPad a communications application called "Proloquo2Go" it designed for the iPhone and the iPod Touch and is offering it for 189.99 dollars in Apple's App Store.
"Prologuo2Go" allows people who have difficulty speaking to communicate using symbols to represent phrases or by typing in what they want to say and having it converted by text-to-speech technology into a natural sounding voice.
Best.

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Answer 4

Sep 22, 2012 2:11 PM in response to Trixie64

Hi Trixie!

There are a ton of GREAT apps for both speech therapy (help regain speech) and augmentive communication (help communicating in the mean time). I am working on designing an app for stroke patients in general, StrokeLink (not speech specific), but through my research have found a number of good speech ones. A company called Lingraphica makes a ton of free apps for various purposes (www (dot) aphasia (dot) com). The above mentioned Proloquo2Go is also good. Another one I have seen used often is My Voice.

Hope this helps!

Morgan

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