Melodic Intonation and Music Therapy are key components for stroke survivors whose language centers were damaged.  Broca’s aphasia, Wernicke’s aphasia, expressive and receptive aphasia – each of these indicates damage to an area(s) that affects language and therefore communication.

For those with difficulty in word recall, using Music Therapy to sing simple songs stimulates the brain’s word recall.  It helps with apraxia as the brain’s muscle memory works to overcome it and pronounce common words used so frequently.  Many stroke survivors find their ability to sing stays intact to varying degrees despite their inability to fluently speak.  This opens the door for brain to mouth connection and facilitates the recovery of language.

Melodic Intonation is the use of melody or simple chords to lilt a word or phrase.  Often right after a stroke, speech therapists will sing or hum a tune until the client can imitate it.  Then they will add words or a phrase to the tune until it becomes easy enough to say as a word without tunes.  

These approaches are very effective for all aspects of aphasia and apraxia.   There are speech therapists who specialize in this particular method and you might find it useful to seek them out if word recall or pronunciation is stalling your speech recovery.