Hippocampal removal affects visual but not auditory naming

Dominant, left anteromedial temporal lobe resection (AMTLR) for seizure control carries risks to verbal episodic memory and visual object naming. Consistent with traditional thinking, verbal memory decline is considered a consequence of hippocampal removal and naming decline has been attributed to lateral temporal resection. Interestingly, recent findings suggest a potential relation between visual naming and hippocampal integrity, which is consistent with studies that link the hippocampus with higher level visual processing. Historically, naming has been evaluated using visual object naming tasks; however, naming can also be assessed using auditory verbal descriptions. Recent cortical stimulation studies have shown a neuroanatomic distinction between visual naming and auditory description naming. We speculated that unlike visual naming, the hippocampus is not involved in auditory naming, and hypothesized that left AMTLR would not result in auditory naming decline, despite visual naming and verbal memory decline.

In this cohort study, we tested auditory naming, visual naming, and verbal memory in 25 left medial temporal lobe epilepsy (MTLE) and 20 right MTLE patients pre-AMTLR and 1 year post-AMTLR.

Left AMTLR patients declined in visual naming and verbal memory, with no decline in auditory naming. Right AMTLR patients exhibited no decline.

Results suggest that left anteromedial temporal lobe resection presents a greater risk to visual naming than auditory naming in patients with left medial temporal lobe epilepsy.