Bridging Languages, Rebuilding Communication: Best Practices for Assessing and Treating Discourse for Bilingual People with Aphasia

A considerable proportion of the global adult population is bilingual; however, research on aphasia and language processing remains predominantly centered on monolingual speakers, leading to reduced understanding and guidance about bilingual aphasia. Bilingual aphasia is not equivalent to monolingual aphasia, as bilinguals process each language differently from monolinguals. As such, they are likely to have different error patterns and recovery processes. Best practice for assessing bilingual individuals with aphasia requires evaluating all languages they have sufficiently acquired. Because st