Bisecting or not bisecting: this is the neglect question. Line bisection performance in the diagnosis of neglect in right brain-damaged patients

Abstract

In the present study we analysed the bisecting behaviour of 287 chronic right brain-damaged patients by taking into account the presence and severity of extrapersonal and/or personal neglect diagnosed with the hemineglect battery. We also analysed right brain-damaged patients who had (or did not have) neglect according to their line bisection performance. Our results showed that performance of the line bisection task correlates with performance of cancellation tasks, reading and perceptual tasks, but not with the presence of personal neglect. Personal neglect seems to be unrelated to line bisection behaviour. Indeed, patients affected by extrapersonal and personal neglect do not show more severe neglect in line bisection than patients with only extrapersonal neglect. Furthermore, we observed that 20.56% of the patients were considered affected or not by neglect on the line bisection task compared with the other spatial tasks of the hemineglect battery. We conclude that using a battery with multiple tests is the only way to guarantee a reliable diagnosis and effectively plan for rehabilitative training.

Figure 1. Means of deviation expressed in mm. in bisecting task for: A. n. 91 Control (−0.61±0.12), n. 157 NoNeg (1.59±7.23) and n. 125 Neg (22.4±21.97) according to the standard battery for assessing hemineglect; B. n. 91 Control (−0.61±0.12), n. 130 NoNeg (1.42±7.13), n. 27 PNoNeg (2.44±7.77), n. 95 PNeg (22.25±21.56) and n. 30 Neg (22.86±23.57) according to the presence/absence of personal neglect; C. n. 91 Control (−0.61±0.12), n. 133 No (NoNeg: 1±6.90), n. 24 Borderline (5±8.30), n. 35 Mild (11.10±11.90), n. 46 Moderate (21.80±24.10) and n. 44 Severe (32.10±21.70) according to the severity or absence of neglect.

Figure 2. Means and standard deviations of Control, NoNeg, PNoNeg, PNeg and Neg in bisecting task.