Recognition of familiar handwriting in stroke and dementia.
Patients with left stroke (n = 17), right stroke (n = 16), and dementia (n = 17) and healthy controls (n = 15) were asked to recognize familiar handwriting among 10 handwritten texts. All healthy controls and 96% of the left-brain-damaged patients were able to recognize the familiar handwriting, but only 44% of the right-brain-damaged and 41% of the dementia patients (none if Mini-Mental Status Test score was <18, n = 5) were able to do so. The authors conclude that the recognition of handwriting is a special skill that is independent of other verbal and lexical tasks.
Heckmann
J G
JG
Department of Neurology, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg at Erlangen, Germany. josef.heckmann@neuro.med.uni-erlangen.de
Lang
C J
CJ
Neundörfer
B
B
D000368:Aged; D002543:Cerebral Hemorrhage / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology; D003704:Dementia / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006236:Handwriting; D006801:Humans; D020244:Infarction, Middle Cerebral Artery / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall / Q000502:physiology; D008609:Mental Status Schedule; D008875:Middle Aged; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed