Assessing everyday memory in patients with dysphasia*

An assessment of the current memory status of patients referred for speech therapy is rarely provided, but may be useful in indicating whether there is memory loss in addition to language deficits. Failure to progress during treatment could be due to failure to remember the content of the previous sessions. Most existing memory tests are unsuitable for assessing subjects with dysphasia. For that reason we sought to modify the Rivermead Behavioural Memory Test (RBMT: Wilson, Cockburn & Baddeley, 1985), which was developed to measure the existence and extent of everyday memory problems and which contains both verbally and non-verbally mediated items. The study described here, based on a sample of 176 brain-injured patients, showed that a mild to moderate language deficit did impair performance on the RBMT. The influence was found to be limited to a subset of verbal memory items. A shortened version of the test was developed and shown to be sensitive to memory deficits and insensitive to the effects of dysphasia. Revised norms for this version of the test are provided. These should enable an estimate to be made of the presence and magnitude of memory deficits in dysphasic patients, allowing treatment to be optimized.