More than half of stroke survivors do not receive rehabilitation after the first days of advanced stroke care. Instead of living for months or years with visible or hidden disabilities, stroke survivors can take advantage of new techniques of advanced rehabilitation to improve their function and freedom.
One condition, called spatial neglect – in which a person’s three-dimensional reality and spatial movements are distorted on one side – is particularly underdiagnosed and undertreated among those who have suffered strokes and other brain injuries.
The Conversation asked neurologist A.M. Barrett and optometrist Kevin Houston, both from UMass Chan Medical School, to explain what causes spatial neglect and how to recognize it.
What is spatial neglect?
Some stroke survivors struggle when navigating the world around them. They walk, sit or stand in a tilted or unbalanced way. Even looking to the side may be challenging. This condition, known as spatial neglect, is a common occurrence after a brain injury.
About half of those in the first weeks and months of stroke recovery have spatial neglect; it is more common after a right brain stroke. Unlike other paired organs, the brain is functionally specialized, and the right brain is dominant for visual-spatial computations and actions.
Although spatial neglect can be accompanied by visual problems or paralysis, especially on the left side of the body, it is a separate problem that makes driving, reading, returning to work and daily self-care many times more difficult.
Most of us take for granted the ability to move and react effortlessly to what is happening around us. But these things are difficult for people with spatial neglect. Their internal map of the three-dimensional world is unreliable on one side.
More than half of stroke survivors do not receive rehabilitation after the first days of advanced stroke care. Instead of living for months or years with visible or hidden disabilities, stroke survivors can take advantage of new techniques of advanced rehabilitation to improve their function and freedom.
One condition, called spatial neglect – in which a person’s three-dimensional reality and spatial movements are distorted on one side – is particularly underdiagnosed and undertreated among those who have suffered strokes and other brain injuries.
The Conversation asked neurologist A.M. Barrett and optometrist Kevin Houston, both from UMass Chan Medical School, to explain what causes spatial neglect and how to recognize it.
What is spatial neglect?
Some stroke survivors struggle when navigating the world around them. They walk, sit or stand in a tilted or unbalanced way. Even looking to the side may be challenging. This condition, known as spatial neglect, is a common occurrence after a brain injury.
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