[Jargonagraphia in a left-handed aphasia due to a left hemisphere lesion]

We report a case who developed jargonagraphia, severe aphasia and unilateral spatial neglect due to cerebral infarction in the left hemisphere. The patient was a 57 year-old left-handed woman. She suddenly developed hemiplegia on the right side and aphasia, and was admitted to our hospital. Neuropsychological examination showed non-fluent spontaneous speech. Repetition, reading and auditory comprehension were impaired. Writing was severely impaired and she showed paragraphia without meaning (jargonagraphia). Right unilateral spatial neglect and buccofacial apraxia were noted, but neither ideomotor nor ideational apraxia was observed. The mechanisms of jargonagraphia remain unknown. The localization of language function in this patient is not a mirror image of same function in dextral aphasia. Her condition was considered that free-running on motor engrams of characters stored in the right hemisphere caused jargonagraphia.