Acute confusional states with right middle cerebral artery infarctions

Three patients presenting predominantly with acute confusional states (ACS) are shown to have infarctions in the distribution of the right middle cerebral artery. It is suggested that the main deficit in ACS is in the function of selective attention. On the basis of cortical connections of homologous areas in the monkey brain, it is argued that this deficit arises from lesions in convergence areas for association cortex.