Scientists have new clues about the roots of an unusual condition called alien hand syndrome.
In alien hand syndrome, the patient's hand moves involuntarily, sometimes forcing the patient to "use their healthy hand to restrain the alien hand's actions," Swiss doctors report in today's early online edition of the Annals of Neurology.
Alien hand syndrome is "rare and distressing," write the doctors, who include Frederic Assal, MD, of the department of clinical neurosciences at University Hospital in Geneva, Switzerland.
Assal and colleagues studied a 70-year-old man who developed alien hand syndrome after suffering a stroke.
Alien hand syndrome affected the man's left hand. The stroke also affected his vision on the left side of his body, so he sometimes didn't know what his left hand was doing.
"For instance," write the doctors, "his left hand could grasp and manipulate parts of clothes or objects, even tear them into pieces, while the patient was [sitting] in his armchair and unaware of these involuntary movements." More MagazineLane.com
In alien hand syndrome, the patient's hand moves involuntarily, sometimes forcing the patient to "use their healthy hand to restrain the alien hand's actions," Swiss doctors report in today's early online edition of the Annals of Neurology.
Alien hand syndrome is "rare and distressing," write the doctors, who include Frederic Assal, MD, of the department of clinical neurosciences at University Hospital in Geneva, Switzerland.
Assal and colleagues studied a 70-year-old man who developed alien hand syndrome after suffering a stroke.
Alien hand syndrome affected the man's left hand. The stroke also affected his vision on the left side of his body, so he sometimes didn't know what his left hand was doing.
"For instance," write the doctors, "his left hand could grasp and manipulate parts of clothes or objects, even tear them into pieces, while the patient was [sitting] in his armchair and unaware of these involuntary movements." More MagazineLane.com
