Mutism after closed head injury.
Prospective study of patients admitted to a hospital for closed head injury showed that nine patients (nearly 3%) became mute for varying periods despite recovery of consciousness and communication through a nonspeech channel. Computed tomography (CT) showed subcortical lesions situated primarily in the putamen and internal capsule of four patients, whereas four of the five patients without subcortical lesions had left-hemisphere cortical injury. The patients without subcortical injury visualized by CT exhibited a longer duration of impaired consciousness consistent with severe diffuse brain injury and they showed more long-term linguistic deficits. We related our findings to recent studies of atypical aphasia after occlusive vascular lesions of the basal ganglia.
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001479:Basal Ganglia / Q000473:pathology; D002648:Child; D006259:Craniocerebral Trauma / Q000150:complications* / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007807:Language Tests; D008297:Male; D009155:Mutism / Q000145:classification / Q000209:etiology* / Q000523:psychology; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed