Probe-evoked potential findings following unilateral left-hemisphere lesions in children
A. C. Papanicolaou, A. DiScenna, L. Gillespie and D. Aram
Division of Neurosurgery, University Texas Medical Branch, Galveston.
An evoked potentials procedure that has repeatedly provided evidence of
predominant right-hemisphere engagement during language tasks in recovered
adult aphasics was applied to the study of 14 children with early
unilateral left-hemisphere lesions and in 14 matched normal subjects. In
contrast with the adult patients, the children with left-hemisphere lesions
displayed the normal pattern of predominant left-hemisphere engagement in
visuospatial tasks. These data suggest that language restitution and
development following early lesions involves intrahemispheric rather than
interhemispheric functional reorganization.
