Table 1.

The application of melodic intonation therapy (MIT) in aphasia poststroke.

Participants	Intervention of MIT	Evaluation	Findings	References
The intervention group (n = 20; 16 males, 4 females) and the control group (n = 20; 15 males, 5 females)	Intervention group receives MIT treatment for 30 min/day, five times a week for 8 weeks	Boston diagnostic aphasia examination, Hamilton anxiety scale, and Hamilton depression scale	MIT has a better effect in fluency, spontaneous naming, object naming, reaction naming, and sentence completing, with a time accumulation effect	[82]
A 63-year-old man, 10 years poststroke, presented with a mild to moderate nonfluent aphasia	Receives MIT treatment 50 min twice weekly and attends a 4 hr socialization program once per week	Apraxia battery for adults, and Boston diagnostic aphasia evaluation	Integration of MIT by adding musical elements improves speech and expressive language skills, combined with a group socialization program	[104]
20 stroke patients with poststroke nonfluent aphasia	Receives MIT treatment for 12 sessions over six weeks	Communicative activity log questionnaire, Boston diagnostic aphasia examination	MIT may have a beneficial effect on the communication skills of stroke patients with nonfluent aphasia	[84]
17 patients with chronic (>1 year) poststroke aphasia. 10 in the MIT group and 7 in the control group	Receives 6 weeks intensive MIT (5 h/week)	Aachen aphasia test, Amsterdam-Nijmegen everyday language test, and Sabadel story retell task	MIT shows limited and temporary effect, suggesting that MIT exerts better effect for chronic aphasia in earlier stages poststroke	[105]
Six patients with severe nonfluent aphasia poststroke	Receives melodic-rhythmic therapy (a modified MIT) treatment 4 days a week for 16 weeks, with sessions of 30-40 min	Aachen aphasia test	MIT significantly improves the ability of spontaneous speech	[85]
Three participants with chronic poststroke Broca's aphasia	Receives MIT treatment in hourly sessions, 3 days per week for 6 weeks	Percent correct information units in connected speech, number of correct syllables in the trained and nontrained sentences, and visual analog mood scales	Combination of rhythm and pitch induces the strongest generalization effect to nontrained stimuli and connected speech. No significant effect in motor-speech agility or mood	[106]
Two patients with nonfluent aphasia poststroke	rTMS therapy (consisted of 3 treatment sessions) followed by 40 min of MIT	Western aphasia battery, fMRI	One patient has improvement in verbal fluency and repetition of phrases, while the other patient has no significant improvement. Neural activity changes are observed in the left Broca's area and right Broca's homolog	[107]
27 participants with subacute severe nonfluent aphasia poststroke	Receives MIT treatment in hourly sessions, 5 h per week for 6 weeks	Aachen aphasia test, semantic association task	MIT treatment has an improvement in verbal communication and language repetition	[108]
A patient with severe nonfluent aphasia poststroke	Receives intensive adapted MIT, attending five, 1.5-hour treatment sessions per week for 16 weeks	fMRI, DTI, and speech and language tasks	MIT induces functional and structural changes in a right hemisphere fronto-temporal network	[109]
30 acute stroke patients with nonfluent aphasia, 14 in the control group, and 16 in the treatment group	Receives a 10 to 15 min MIT session	Western aphasia battery	Significant immediate improvements in speech output after one session of MMIT training	[110]
Six patients with nonfluent aphasia at least 1 year postonset of first ischemic stroke	Treatment sessions are administered one per day for 3 consecutive days. The stimulation period of tDCS lasts for 20 min and combines with 20 min MIT	Boston diagnostic aphasia examination, verbal fluency tests	Transcranial direct current stimulation plus MIT contributes to significant improvements in fluency of speech, by enhancing activity in a right hemisphere sensorimotor network for articulation	[111]
Six patients with nonfluent aphasia at least 1 year postonset of first left hemisphere stroke	Receives an intense fashion with 75–80 daily therapy sessions	MRI and DTI; behavioral tests include number of correct information units/min produced during spontaneous speech, picture descriptions, and descriptions of common procedures	MTI increases the number of arcuate fasciculus fibers and arcuate fasciculus volume and improves the speech outcome	[112]