Trends in head injury incidence in New Zealand: a hospital-based study from 1997/1998 to 2003/2004.

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a leading cause of disability and death in young adults. Globally, the incidence of TBI hospitalizations is estimated at 200-300 people per 100,000 annually. Using a national health database, we examined the incidence of TBI-related hospital discharges (including 1-day stays) to New Zealand Hospitals from 1997/1998 to 2003/2004.

Long-term cognitive outcome of hemiconvulsion-hemiplegia-epilepsy syndrome affecting the left cerebral hemisphere.

Long-term cognitive outcome following hemiconvulsion-hemiplegia-epilepsy (HHE) syndrome has been poorly studied, with little attention to the implications of side of involvement in HHE. This retrospective study describes language lateralization and cognitive performance in five patients with HHE syndrome affecting the left cerebral hemisphere. All of the patients had to have intracarotid sodium amytal testing (IAT) to be included in this study.

Memory span on the Wechsler Scales.

This study had two goals. One was to assess whether the WMS-III Spatial Span subtest operates as a visual analogue of Digit Span while the second was to determine whether backward span is a more sensitive measure of working memory than the forward span condition. Analyses based on the WAIS-III-WMS-III standardization and clinical group data revealed some important distinctions between Digit and Spatial Span.

Confirmatory factor analysis of the WMS-III in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy.

Five competing models specifying the factor structure underlying the Wechsler Memory Scale-Third Edition (D. Wechsler, 1997b) primary subtest scores were evaluated in a sample of patients with intractable temporal lobe epilepsy (N = 254). Models specifying separate immediate and delayed constructs resulted in inadmissible parameter estimates and model specification error.