Chris Gibbons
Senior Vice President, Smartbox Assistive Technology
Chris Gibbons has worked in a variety of AAC clinical, research, and industry settings as a private practitioner, assistive technology specialist, instructor, and consultant. As a licensed Speech-Language Pathologist specializing in AAC for more than 25 years, he has focused solely on advocating for and contributing to SGD user success through increased access efficiencies and by working to improve funding for SGDs. Chris is Senior Vice President at Smartbox Assistive Technology.
MY SESSIONS
A Rehabilitation Journey: AAC Supports for People with Aphasia and Communication Partners
Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) is often underutilized in aphasia intervention despite its potential to support meaningful communication, foster independence, and promote recovery. Research supports the benefits of AAC for people with aphasia in the recovery of language skills and daily communication (Dietz et al., 2020; Griffiths et al., 2014). Importantly, lite and high-tech AAC tools in aphasia therapy contribute to richer, more rewarding real-world interaction, language retrieval, and personalized communication for individuals with varying levels of aphasia. Using Aphasia Duo in Grid AAC software as the example, this session will highlight multimodal AAC tools, communication partner strategies, with conversation-focused, personalized messages that can be employed to support the changing communication and interaction needs for people with aphasia.