Clinical research on thalamic aphasia

MAI Wei-hua; KOU Li; LIU Han-wei; HAN Rong-rong

doi:10.3760/cma.j.issn.1673-4777.2011.03.016

Abstract：Objective To study the language characteristics, anatomical mechanism and prognosis of thalamic aphasia caused by cerebrovascular diseases of thalamus. Methods Thirteen patients with thalamic aphasia during June 2002 to July 2008 in our department were studied. Aphasia examination, physical examination of central nervous system, routine laboratory examinations, as well as CT and MRI scanning of brain were taken. All patients were treated according to thalamic infarction or hemorrhage. Results All patients presented as sparse verbal output and low tone, 3 cases accompanied with anomia, 10 cases with paraphasia, and 11 cases with disturbance of comprehension. Thalamic hemorrhage in dominant hemisphere was detected in three cases by CT scanning. Among the other ten patients with normal CT, lacunar infarction in ventrolateral nucleus of thalamas (VL) of dominant hemisphere was detected in nine cases, while lacunar infarction in dorsomedial nucleus of thalamas ( DM ) of dominant hemisphere was detected in one case. The manifestations of thalamic aphasia disappeared after treatment for 5 ～ 12 days in all patients. Conclusions Thalamic aphasia has its own language characteristics, which is different from cortical aphasia. VL and DM in dominant hemisphere are probably the responsible lesions for it. MRI scanning of brain is sensitive toboth thalamic infarction and hemorrhage, which is good for lesion detection. The prognosis of thalamic aphasia is good.