Primary progressive aphasia
therapy that helps you keep communicating
Primary progressive aphasia (PPA) is a condition where language gradually changes over time, usually from an underlying neurodegenerative process. Speech therapy can't cure PPA, but it can help you keep communicating: building strategies, practicing the words and skills that matter most, and coaching the people around you. The goal is to maintain function, independence, and connection for as long as possible.
A gradual change in language should be evaluated by a physician, often a neurologist, for an accurate diagnosis. Speech therapy works alongside your medical team, not in place of it.
What is primary progressive aphasia?
Primary progressive aphasia is a form of language change caused by a slow, underlying neurodegenerative process. Unlike aphasia after a stroke, which begins suddenly and often improves, PPA develops gradually over months and years. It can affect finding words, forming sentences, or understanding language, while other abilities may stay strong for a long time.
What can change
- Finding everyday words
- Putting words into sentences
- Understanding what others say
- Reading and writing
What therapy focuses on
- Keeping personally important words and phrases
- Communication supports and backup tools
- Coaching for family and care partners
- Planning ahead as needs change
How can speech therapy help with PPA or early dementia?
Therapy for a progressive condition looks different from recovery after a stroke. The aim is to protect communication and connection at each stage: strengthening the words and skills you use most, setting up supports before they're needed, and making sure the people around you know what helps. It's steady, practical work built around your life.
Focus on what matters most
We identify the words, names, phrases, and routines that are most important to you, and practice them while practice is most effective.
Build supports and backups
Communication books, personalized word lists, phones and simple AAC tools, so you have dependable ways to be understood as language changes.
Coach your care partners
Family and close friends learn how to support conversations, reduce frustration, and use the same strategies at home every day.
Plan ahead together
We revisit the plan over time and adjust it as needs change, keeping the focus on function, independence, and connection.
Supporting families and care partners
PPA and early dementia affect the whole family, not just one person. A large part of this work is helping care partners feel confident: how to give time, how to offer a word without taking over, how to use supports, and how to keep conversations warm even on hard days. When everyone shares the same strategies, connection holds.
Marina Coakley, M.S., CCC-SLP
Licensed speech-language pathologist providing virtual therapy for adults with acquired and progressive neurological conditions across Tennessee, Kentucky, California, and North Carolina. Read Marina's background.
Common questions about PPA and early dementia
Why a specialist
Adult neurologic communication recovery is my specialty
After a stroke or brain injury, the person is still fully there. Their thoughts, their humor, their personality are all intact. What's changed is the bridge between thought and word, and that bridge can be rebuilt. Helping adults do that, after aphasia, brain injury, and stroke, is the work I trained for in skilled-nursing and outpatient rehab, and the work I care most about.
Credentialed and trained for it
M.S., CCC-SLP, licensed in four states, with clinical training in skilled-nursing and outpatient rehab supporting adults after stroke and brain injury.
Methods that fit you
Approaches with a track record, chosen for your goals and the life you want back.
Virtual across four states
Telehealth in Tennessee, Kentucky, California, and North Carolina, from home.
