Modular structure of awareness for sensorimotor disorders: evidence from anosognosia for hemiplegia and anosognosia for hemianaesthesia.

In the present paper, we shall review clinical evidence and theoretical models related to anosognosia for sensorimotor impairments that may help in understanding the normal processing underlying conscious self-awareness. The dissociations between anosognosia for hemiplegia and anosognosia for hemianaesthesia are considered to give important clinical evidence supporting the hypothesis that awareness of sensory and motor deficits depends on the functioning of discrete self-monitoring processes. We shall also present clinical and anatomical data on four single case reports of patients selectively affected by anosognosia for hemianaesthesia.

Crossed right hemisphere syndrome following left thalamic stroke.

In most right-handed people, language and motor functions are more reliant on systems of the left hemisphere while several non-linguistic visuo-spatial and attentional processes depend more on the right hemisphere. The rare exceptions to these rules provide important clues as to what functions co-lateralise, and are thus crucial for models of cerebral specialization. Here we report on the case of a patient, who, after a lesion restricted to the left thalamic region, showed signs normally associated with right hemispheric injury including motor impersistence, visuo-spatial dysfunction and poor comprehension of facial expression.