The spinal accessory nerve in childhood hemiplegia

J. C. Marcus
Department of Neurology, State University of New York Health Science Center, Brooklyn.

Fifteen of 17 children with hemiplegia were found to have weakness of the trapezius muscle but a normally functioning sternocleidomastoid muscle. Very few other cranial nerve-mediated deficits were found. The difference between the two muscles, both supplied by the spinal accessory nerve, may depend on a phylogenetic basis, with the former behaving like an appendicular muscle and the latter like an axial muscle.