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Updated: Aug 25, 2025
Gathering Self-Initiated Rat Behavioral Data to Characterize Post-Stroke Deficits
Published on: March 15, 2024
Establishing reporting standards for participant characteristics in post-stroke aphasia research: An international
Sarah J Wallace1,2, Megan Isaacs1,2, Myzoon Ali3
1School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences, 1974The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia.
Objective:
To establish international, multidisciplinary expert consensus on minimum participant characteristic reporting standards in aphasia research (DESCRIBE project).
Methods:
An international, three-round e-Delphi exercise and consensus meeting, involving multidisciplinary researchers, clinicians and journal editors working academically or clinically in the field of aphasia.
Results:
Round 1 of the DESCRIBE e-Delphi exercise (n = 156) generated 113 items, 20 of which reached consensus by round 3. The final consensus meeting (n = 19 participants) established DESCRIBE's 14 participant characteristics that should be reported in aphasia studies: age; years of education; biological sex; language of treatment/testing; primary language; languages used; history of condition(s) known to impact communication/cognition; history of previous stroke; lesion hemisphere; time since onset of aphasia; conditions arising from the neurological event; and, for communication partner participants, age, biological sex and relationship to person with aphasia. Each characteristic has been defined and matched with standard response options to enable consistent reporting.
Conclusion:
Aphasia research studies should report the 14 DESCRIBE participant characteristics as a minimum. Consistent adherence to the DESCRIBE minimum reporting standard will reduce research wastage and facilitate evidence-based aphasia management by enabling replication and collation of research findings, and translation of evidence into practice.
