1992 Volume 12 Issue 4 Pages 345-350
An 84-year-old right-handed woman exhibited a “ posture schema ” disorder following right fronto-parietal subcortical hematoma. She had the sensation of rotating at an angle of 90 degrees forward in her sagittal plane. This case provided some hints as to the mechanism of postural recognition.
She showed hemiplegia and hypesthesia on her left side. A CT scan disclosed a subcortical hematoma in the right fronto-parietal junctional area. On the fourth day in hospital, she clained to feel as if she were standing, squatting or sitting vertically, but actually she was lying on her bed horizontally. In addition, she felt as if the scenery surrounding her was rotating at an angle of 90 degrees forward. This symptom continued even when she closed her eyes, but disappeared when she sat on the bed vertically. The symptom disappeared three days later. This peculiar “ postural schema ” disorder is difficult to explain by means of either a body schema disorder or impairment of visual spatial recognition. It could be postulated that a transient stimulation to the parietal association area by a subcortical hematoma had disturbed integrated processing between somatosensory, visual and vestibular information, resulting in the peculiar “ postural schema ” disorder.
