The programme development grant started on 1st September 2021 and ended on 31st August 2023, and was funded by the NIHR.

Here you’ll find out what the project was about, what we did, and what we achieved!

Who are we?

We had a big team! Check out Meet the team and Meet the wider team to find out more about us.

What is the APT project?

the APT project is a new research project. APT stands for Aphasia Partnership Training.

What is aphasia? Click here to find out more.

Aphasia affects the whole family, ​ not just the person​ with aphasia.

Communication partner training (CPT) is a type of therapy for people with aphasia and their families.

CPT may help people with aphasia and their family to have good conversations again…

…but at the moment, CPT is not routinely offered by speech and language therapists in the National Health Service (NHS) in the United Kingdom.

Why partnership training, not partner training?

Our project is about partnership training because we want to include and work proactively with both the person with aphasia and their family member.

This is not always the case in CPT – sometimes training only focuses on the person with aphasia, or their family member, and not both people together.

What is our ambition?

Our ambition is to develop meaningful and effective aphasia partnership training for people with aphasia and their families that will be available on the NHS.

The APT project is the 1st step towards achieving this ambition.

What will we do?

We will find out what works best and what matters most to people with aphasia and their families.

We will use what we learn to develop a new CPT programme that will help families communicate better in their everyday lives.

How will we do this?

We will look at:

• research
• theory
• expert opinions of
  • people with aphasia in the UK
  • family members of people with aphasia in the UK
  • speech and language therapists in the UK
  • researchers across the world

We will find out:

• What should be included in the CPT?
• When people take part in CPT, what changes or outcomes would they like to achieve?
• How much do people agree?

You can find out more about the APT project by exploring our website.


If you would like to talk to the team, please contact us.