1. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2016/feb/14/spokane-‐scientist-‐leading-‐researcher-‐on-‐aphasia/
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Spokane Scientist Leading Researcher on Aphasia
by Erica Curless
The Spokesman-Review
Spokane, Washington — Sunday, February 14, 2016
Dick Steele has led the development of groundbreaking technologies to help
treat aphasia, one of the most common speech disorders.
(Photos by Dan Pelle, danp@spokesman.com)
Spokane scientist Richard Steele had career angst, a feeling that he could do more. So 30
years ago he custom-made a job that launched him as a world expert in helping people
with aphasia improve their speech and communication after strokes and brain injuries.
That was the birth of what is today known as Lingraphica, the leading provider of
communication devices and apps for people with aphasia, a communication disorder that
affects a person’s ability to process and use language. Aphasia often makes it difficult for
people to speak, understand speech and read and write.
2. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2016/feb/14/spokane-‐scientist-‐leading-‐researcher-‐on-‐aphasia/
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It’s estimated 2 million people in the nation have aphasia, with problems ranging from
difficulty retrieving the name of objects to severe damage to the portion of the brain
responsible for language, making communication nearly impossible.
Lingraphica lead the research to dispel the century-long belief that patients had only a
six-month window of “spontaneous recovery” after a stroke or brain injury for successful
rehab therapy. Steele said people with aphasia can make on-going significant
improvements.
“We show people long after (six months) that they remain candidates if they have the
right tools, methods and benefits,” said Steele, the company’s chief scientist and an
original founder in the Silicon Valley startup that is now based in New Jersey.
The company is also leading efforts to bring more recognition and awareness about
aphasia. Four times as many people are diagnosed with it annually than cerebral palsy or
amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) combined. Yet aphasia doesn’t have as high a profile.
It’s common for people to contact Lingraphica years after their initial diagnosis, asking
about what more they can do to help their communication, Steele said. That’s why the
company has a wide offering of tool and programs, from 14 free apps to practice speech
to the AllTalk device that can use EyeGaze technology and an on-screen keyboard to type
what the patient wants the device to speak.
Lingraphica also offers online therapy with more than 11,500 language and cognitive
exercises that are used by therapists and individuals. Clinicians can also link to clients
and provide online therapy sessions. There are also virtual support groups.
Dick Steele, of Lingraphica, produces devices that help people with speech disorders
communicate.
3. http://www.spokesman.com/stories/2016/feb/14/spokane-‐scientist-‐leading-‐researcher-‐on-‐aphasia/
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Eastern Washington University uses Lingraphica devices in its diagnostic clinic for
alternative and augmentative communications. Jane Pimentel, an associate professor in
the Department of Communications Disorders, said the therapy programs help put
practice sentences and icons in real-life context. It’s also therapy that people can do every
day, on their own and take ownership of the results.
“It’s really grounded in excellent theory and research that Dick has been involved in from
day one,” Pimentel said.
She added that even though Steele isn’t a trained therapist, he has a good perspective and
understands what it’s like to have aphasia and an inability to communicate. He holds
three U.S. patents related to rehabilitation.
With an undergraduate degree in physics from Stanford University and a master’s and
doctorate in Slavic languages and linguistics from Harvard University, it took Steele
years to find the world of aphasia rehab. He taught Slavic language and linguistics at
several colleges and universities and, for fun, taught himself computer technology. That’s
when he decided he needed to do something more so he combined his love for language,
his interest in creating models and predicting outcomes along with his desire to teach and
help people.
He quit teaching and took a job with the Rehabilitation Research and Development
Center of the Palo Alto Veterans Administration Medical Center. There he was
introduced to aphasia research, at that time in the 1980s, it was basically using index
cards with icons on them to help stimulate the brain and word recognition. With two
other partners, they took on a project to use emerging technology for aphasia
rehabilitation. In 1991, the first devices were ready for market.
“It gives me really great pleasure to have helped people,” Steele said, on a recent
morning in his South Hill home. Since marrying his wife (former Spokesman-Review
reporter Karen Dorn Steele) in 1983, Steele worked in California and spent one week a
month in Spokane. That changed in 2001, when he moved to Spokane permanently and
now telecommutes and flies to New Jersey regularly.
With a wild plume of long, graying hair, Steele has the look of a stereotypical mad
scientist. He’s intense, yet good-natured, always open for a laugh or joke – and anything
but mad. At 74, he’s energized and aspirational, constantly working to innovate how to
improve technology and networks so people with aphasia to regain use and understanding
of language.
He sat at the dining table, with one of the first computers loaded with Lingraphica
software. It looks like a safe, large and thick. It sat beside a thin laptop, where he
demonstrated a word-association exercise that focuses on identifying objects in a house.
He clicked on the house icon. It got large and leaped out of the screen, a technique that
returns humans to the basic instinct to notice something that jumps at you. The icon cut
