Severe personality changes after unilateral left paramedian thalamic infarct.
Personality changes are not uncommon after paramedian thalamic infarction, but usually bilateral or relatively large lesions, often complicated by other neurological or neuropsychological deficits, are present. 'Pure' cases of unilateral lesions are extremely rare. We report that a right-handed, 48-year-old man, who was hypertensive and diabetic but had no prior psychiatric history, developed severe personality changes and a frontal-like syndrome after recovery from acute-onset impairment of consciousness at the age of 43. Other neurological and neuropsychological disturbances, especially verbal and visual amnesia, were unremarkable. MRI showed a very small infarct in the left paramedian area of the thalamus, mainly involving the dorsomedial nucleus.
Fukutake
Toshio
T
Department of Neurology, Chiba University Graduate School of Medicine, Chiba, Japan. fukutake@med.m.chiba-u.ac.jp
Akada
Koichi
K
Ito
Shoichi
S
Okuda
Tomoko
T
Ueki
Yoshihiro
Y
D000328:Adult; D002544:Cerebral Infarction / Q000503:physiopathology*; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000503:physiopathology; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006801:Humans; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D020645:Mediodorsal Thalamic Nucleus / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008569:Memory Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010551:Personality