04/06/2026
This month, we’re launching a new weekly Fireside series focused on key topics in neurorehabilitation. Each week, we’ll take a closer look at a specific clinical challenge, research area, or patient experience shaping the future of rehabilitation and recovery.
For June, our focus is Aphasia Awareness Month and an important question: how can XR rehabilitation be designed to better support people living with aphasia?
If you’re unfamiliar with the term, aphasia affects a person’s ability to communicate and is most commonly caused by brain injury or stroke, affecting around one third of survivors. It can impact speaking, reading, writing, and understanding language, often creating barriers within traditional rehabilitation settings that can be frustrating and distressing to the patient. While rehabilitation technology often focuses only on physical recovery, many people using these tools are also navigating communication difficulties that can create barriers to participation.
At NeuroVirt, supporting people with aphasia has been an important consideration throughout our co-design process. We have worked alongside stroke survivors with aphasia and collaborated with aphasia specialist Anna Volkmer of the University College London to help shape how instruction is presented across the platform to create the most accessible XR tool.
Because communication needs vary from person to person, NeuroVirt combines visual, auditory, and haptic feedback rather than relying on a single method of instruction. Prompts are intentionally designed to be simple, clear, and consistent, helping patients navigate activities more independently. Our in-game guide, NeuroBot can also provide additional support and instruction when a patient appears to be struggling with a task or instruction.
Importantly, these considerations sit alongside a rehabilitation experience that provides high quality and high repetition to aid in better recovery. We believe rehabilitation technology should be highly accessible to the people who need it, including the many stroke and brain injury survivors living with aphasia and other cognitive or communication challenges.
We would love to hear your experiences of aphasia and how you create positive environments to support it - whether personal or clinical - so please get in touch if you would like to continue the conversation.
-Eve