topographic evaluation of aphasia in 100 stroke patients

introduction: aphasia is a common manifestation of stroke and evaluation of relationships of aphasia and brain topography could lead to better understanding of cognitive neurophysiology. methods: 100 stroke patients with aphasia admitted in valie-asr hospital, khorasan since april 2003 were enrolled in this prospective cross-sectional study. diagnosis of stroke and aphasia was made by a neurologist and topography of involved cerebrovascular territories confirmed by topographic maps of brain in ct scan. results: global, broca and wernicke subtypes of aphasia constituted 52%, 40% and 6% of the cases, respectively. based on the usual nourishment of broca and wernicke areas by anterior and posterior cortical branches of the middle cerebral artery, 79% of global, 47% of broca and 50% of wernicke aphasias had compatible infarct topography. the infarct topography in other cases was not congruent with the involved linguistic areas of their brain. conclusion: specific cerebrovascular topography for subtypes of aphasia in stroke patients was not found. the effects of cerebrovascular lesions on linguistic functions are not predictable by their topography in ct scan.