A material-control single-case study of the efficacy of treatment for written and oral naming difficulties

Twenty-two right-handed aphasics with written and/or oral naming difficulties were treated with a traditional language therapy: copying and repetition of words. The efficacy and maintainability of the treatment were evaluated using a variation of the single-case design, which was termed the material-control single-case design. Effectiveness of the treatment for written naming difficulty was demonstrated for 9 of 21 subjects in a first treatment and 3 of 14 subjects in a second treatment. Three of the 14 subjects benefitted overall from both treatments in written naming. In oral naming, 2 of 18 subjects responded well to the first treatment while 2 of 16 responded well to the second treatment. One of the 16 subjects showed benefits from both the first and second treatments in oral naming. Although written and oral naming disturbances were difficult to improve using ordinary language treatment, a small proportion of subjects clearly showed effectiveness of the therapy. Maintenance of the effects of treatment was observed in all of the improvers.