Hospital Clínico San Carlos in Madrid-led research reports that intermittent theta-burst transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) paired with language therapy over six months was associated with positive outcomes in primary progressive aphasia (PPA). Improvements included less decline in regional brain metabolism and improvements in language abilities, functional independence, and neuropsychiatric symptoms.

Primary progressive aphasia is a neurodegenerative clinical syndrome with insidious onset characterized by prominent speech and/or language impairment. It is a syndrome that can be the mode in which common causes of dementia, Alzheimer’s disease and frontotemporal degeneration are initially present.

According to current international consensus criteria, three variants are recognized: nonfluent/agrammatic, semantic, and logopenic. Speech-language intervention has proven to be beneficial.